Midnight Queen
by kimmiesjoy
Summary: With a new bar open in town and his team AWOL Castle takes on a little undercover mission of his own, never dreaming that 'Ace in the Hole' is where he'll find his Midnight Queen.
1. Prologue

The prologue and first six chapters of this story are Co-authored by **kimmiesjoy** and **demuredemeanor**, beyond chapter six is written solely by **kimmiesjoy.**

Thank you for reading.

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><p><strong>Prologue<strong>

_She's gonna be my __**Midnight Queen**__._

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><p>It's dark, darker than it should be, the overhead street light has been broken and shards of forgotten glass crunch under her heels as he backs her into the wall.<p>

The cold New York brick is harsh at her back, cutting like icy fingers through the almost sheer material of her black tank top. The thin straps clinging to the grooves of her shoulders now, she has recently tugged them into place, but every so often they slip.

He pushes her, guiding her backwards with his hands at her hips, fingers hot pin pricks on the narrow grooves of her pelvis, moving further until they reach the wall. He notices the strap slip again, the slow progression her hand makes towards sliding it back up. He catches her as she reaches for it, stopping her.

Her eyes lift, bright sparks in the near pitch-black alley that dart to his lips, to his eyes as he hooks the thin piece of cotton under his index finger and slides it back onto her shoulder, settling it over her now very visible bra strap. Black cotton like the tank.

He thumbs the material above her skin, catching the absence of street light in her eyes.

She doesn't need it.

She's luminescent enough.

But, leaning closer, he sees instead the reflection of the skyline, the city lights and its lively hum dancing across her pupil, contrasting her iris, speckling the brown with hints of gold and red.

She's humming too.

Unable to resist, he slips his thumb beneath the material again, under both layers as they caress her shoulder, running the pad across her silky skin.

She's warm.

She's not really. It's a trick of the light, or lack thereof, because what she really is, is tingly. Chilly from the breeze and the fact she is wearing next to nothing, but where his fingers brush the cotton away from her skin there is a blaze, roaring infernos of _heat_.

She shivers, a gentle shudder that racks her body from head to toe and stutters through her chest, even vibrates the strands of her hair.

His hand stiffens as he feels the ripples pass through her and he lays it flat against her skin, presses his heated, soft palm to her shoulder, flat over her deltoid, no longer trailing, no testing movement.

He just holds her.

"Are you cold?" His voice is gravelly, husky in a way that causes his breath to gust past her cheek. He watches her eyes close as she leans into it, the feel of his exhale hot against her skin.

He does it again. just because he can now.

"Kate?"

Her fingers move and take him by surprise, rising between them to catch his t-shirt, fisting her hands just inside his jacket (leather, she'd insisted). He feels her nails trail as she recoils, sliding to the edge of the shiny material, the soft, supple leather finding her fingers as she clings to it, suspended weights at the base of the zipper, toying.

He exhales again, measured, steady but then she drops it, abrupt, sudden.

Her hands are slipping underneath, sliding again, wrapping around him. Has she always had nails? How has he not noticed the nails she's now digging into his skin, through his t-shirt as she climbs, crawls?

That's what he's thinking? R_eally_?

When she can finally drag her eyes open, lifting her lids to meet his gaze she tilts her head back, rests the base of her skull against the alley wall as she breathes out on a smile.

"Not cold, no." Her free hand climbs higher, mirroring the first, slipping up his coat to rest against him. Her fingers firm over his chest and hip as she pulls him closer, bringing the warmth and heat with him. "Not now."

Her eyes are over his shoulder, focused on something he can't see, but her fingers are tight against him and he remembers why he's here, realizes she does too.

She makes a noise, shocked as he crowds even closer, not missing the fact her face is at his neck.

"Castle," she hisses, trying to catch her breath.

"It's fine just..." His voice cracks, he smiles. He's pressed so close and she doesn't need to ask more.

"Oh."

His head drops, his brow pressing at the naked edge of her shoulder and he huffs a laugh across her skin, it's not an embarrassed laugh, it's resigned, he won't curse his body for reacting to her.

It's natural, her and him. _Chemistry._

She doesn't wriggle anymore, just falls still pressed against him, the tingles of his laughter dancing across her skin, making it _hard_.

"_Oh_!"

Her laughter is a silent shake as she bites her lip, it's all _very _hard. Her hands deep beneath his jacket, seeking his warmth, seeking him now, unexpectedly, catching her off guard.

But it doesn't, not really. She wants him as close as he wants her. She wants to be as near as she can be.

"More." She feels bad for asking it of him, it's obvious his control is at a knife's edge anyway but this was _his_ idea, and she enjoys pressing his buttons just a bit, the way he does hers.

He doesn't argue, more than willing to dive in, lift her a little higher, hand slipping over her thigh to hook her leg around his waist. His fingers are firm at the cusp of her dark denim shorts, the too short shorts in the still too cold weather, but he loves how exposed she is when dressed like this.

How open her face is when he _touches_ her.

He's shocked when she arches into the wall, letting him grope her hooked leg, and then he's the one gasping, grip tight at her hip and thigh as she kicks off from the ground and anchors herself firmly around his waist.

He feels her heels hook, and lock, dragging his pelvis firmly into hers as she's perched there. His weight keeping her upright, pressing himself against her. He hears her exhale, feels it against his neck, ragged breath, like she doesn't care that her mouth is open against his skin.

A gruff noise rips from his throat, and she giggles, presses her face to his ear and whispers, teasing and conspiring.

_With_ him and _against_ him.


	2. Chapter One

Co-authored by **kimmiesjoy** and **demuredemeanor.**

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><p><strong>Chapter One.<strong>

_I'm in a bar full of bikers and a handful of junkies,_

_It's a fifty-fifty chance that they're planning to jump me._

_**Twenty-four hours earlier.**_

He groans, very loudly, for what must be the fifth time in as many minutes, his hands fisted in frustration. The cursor is flashing at him, haunting him, tormenting him as it blinks in stark contrast to the blank page.

He'd stopped watching it, not bothering, not needing another reminder that he's stuck. He can't find the words, not a single one.

He should have given up staring at the stupid cursor days ago. But he can't, won't. He is not the type of person to give up, especially on something, and even someone, he cares about passionately.

What does he do if he doesn't write?

He sighs, long and loud.

It's pathetic.

He's a best-selling author, a leader of his genre, a master of the macabre. He can do this without her. He's done it before.

He closes his eyes, blocking out the tormenting flashing on the laptop screen before him, the barrier is not thick enough to shield him from the blinding white of the screen.

He'd been fine a few days ago, writing outlines, forming long detailed plans and creating his fake murder board, making it rival those he's been working with at the precinct, with _her_, staring at them both for hours.

Castle has hit a wall. A proverbial brick _wall_, an obstacle he can't tear down, can't get around.

Another one.

_Just _what he needs.

He's gotten lost in the flashing cursor, nothing to distract him, no calls from his partner, his muse or even his 'better-half' as his mother so aptly termed her a few weeks earlier.

But she's not _his_ and that's a whole _other_issue he's not even going to dwell on.

He tilts back in the chair, his hands clenched on the keyboard of his laptop as he curses under his breath, and deletes the last three, sad, little words he has written:

**Where is she?**

She's been making an effort. She's opening up, slowly. Too damn slowly, but she's trying and he knows, he understands. She offers smiles now, flirts more, uninhibited, and those unguarded looks she gets in her eyes as he takes her by surprise and makes her laugh, unbridled, are becoming a habit, a ritual.

He knows she's trying, in every damned sense of the word. The thought makes another wave of annoyance and frustration hits him square in the gut.

She's still trying, even though she's holed up in a dingy motel for the week, with the boys, a team bonding thing, a training exercise Gates had forbidden him from being a part of because it's a mandatory police only outing.

No tag-along wanna-bes. No writer's-turned-cop. No distractions for her people.

No understanding!

He is one of her people, at least he thinks he is, he should be, he wants to be vital to the team and keep her safe. He is. Kate knows that.

She'd sounded disappointed as she told him late one night, quietly confessing it like a sin, across the cups of coffee he gave her while he hung back to 'help' with the paper work.

She'd told him she was leaving in the morning, short notice she'd added with a shrug. He had nodded and offered his understanding, it was how her job worked sometimes. She'd smiled, eyes downcast and coy as she promised him she'd talk to him when she could, like she was bound to it, obligated.

And she'd kept the promise.

At first.

They'd exchanged messages the entire first day, Kate, the instigator, with a little quip about murdering Esposito if he kept humming, complaining it would be a long week with Ryan's constant talk of Jenny and she was bored.

He'd reassured her, told her he would help her hide the body, to be strong and consider the alternative, being stuck there with him, adding a bracketed message telling her to stop rolling her eyes.

Then he had kept writing, ignoring the way his eyes constantly strayed to his phone. The words were flowing, it didn't matter.

But now it's been four days since he's heard her voice, seen her face, and two since she's sent him anything. His phone is now an idle mockery as it sits on his desk, taunting him with the knowledge that the timing of his missing words and the lack of Kate are far too similar to be coincidence.

And he really doesn't believe in coincidence.

He has to get out of here, out of the loft and away from his phone, the flashing laptop and the row of books, the posters, the plaques, the accolades that all remind him of her.

Not even Alexis has been able to drag him out of this sunken hole. That's a sign this has gone too far. And he's not prepared to let his see him woefully missing his partner and completely bored, floundering, useless even, after less than a week of separation.

Not again.

He's going to bury himself in the cellar of The Old Haunt, settle in with a bottle of golden scotch and let the magic, the warmth of the liquid, the atmosphere itself, the heat of it all overwhelm him, force his muse from his mind and let the numbness fill her place.

For tonight anyway.

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><p>It's surprising the short time it takes him to arrive at his bar. Shucking his coat at the door he enters preparing to be enveloped in the noise and general debauchery of what has quickly become a cop hang out.<p>

Castle stops, still, just inside the door his eyes scrunching in confusion.

The place is dead, deserted, baron and bare.

Granted it _is_ mid-week. Wednesday, he has noticed, traditionally being the worst business day for the bar.

But…seriously?

Where the hell is everyone?

He has had an open door policy for the folks from the 12th since he brought the place, not just the homicide division, not just _his_ team, _her_ team, whatever.

Not just Beckett, Ryan and Esposito.

No, he extends the welcoming atmosphere to anyone who dedicates their life, in any capacity, to the force.

First drinks are always on the house and those that follow are substantially discounted.

He understands they don't always feel like drinking after their day, stressful or not, alcohol is not always as inviting as the call of home, of family, of bed, after a horrendous case, or just the mind wearying stacks of paperwork.

But come on…this is like a post-apocalyptic zombie world.

Everything dead, deserted, derelict.

There's one guy he's never seen before, his sunken eyes and sallow cheeks make him seem homeless, drug-deprived. He's sitting in a booth, nursing a glass, spinning it, not far from where Castle's own picture hangs on the wall. There are two…no, three people are on stools at the bar, regulars.

But that's it.

He walks toward the bar, avoiding something sticky on the floor and drops into a seat. The soft leather of the stool is oddly comforting as he catches the eye of the bartender.

"Quiet?" Castle queries, letting his eyes roam the room and take in the lack of customers again.

"Yup." The man slides a glass towards him, fully prepared to offer him the usual. Damn, he hires good people.

The place has never been about making money, but it does have a loyal clientele, spending just enough to keep the place floating, paying it's own way. The atmosphere keeps them coming back. But apparently tonight there is a better offer, a game or some event he's missed in his haze of writing, the procrastination.

"Something on?" he asks the kid quietly, flicking his eyes around again, just checking he hasn't missed a new arrival. He knows he would have heard the heavy thud of the door, felt the cold slip inside. But he hasn't, knows he probably won't.

The younger man chuckles quietly, wistfully to himself, then Castle watches, curious, as he flicks his gaze up to him, realising his boss (technically) is not sharing the joke.

"You haven't heard?" the kid asks, a little awestruck, amazed.

He is most certainly missing _something_. Has he really been in that much of a funk?

Has he really been that lost without her?

Surely not.

Probably has.

Castle gives his own chuckle, off beat and forced, not knowing what else to do before he speaks.

The young man is giving off a vibe, it's worrying him.

"Heard what?" he asks. He's kind of concerned that something dire has happened, some incident that he should be home for, out of respect, instead of out in the streets. It seems like that's what everyone else is doing.

"Didn't they tell you about that new bar, what's it called?" He's asking Castle, like he knows about this.  
>He most certainly doesn't. But he's not really being asked. "Um," he clicks his fingers, thinking, remembering, "Ace in the Hole, just a few blocks over?"<p>

"Oh," he swallows, "popular is it?" he asks, trying to sound a little nonchalant, but he knows he's failing.

"Yeah, apparently. A few friends went the other night. It's a bit grungy for my taste," he shrugs, "but they said it had a good atmosphere. Plus it was opening night." He stops to regard his superior. "I bet it's died off a little now though. It's almost been open a week." A poor attempt at a reassurance, but Castle doesn't care.

Really he doesn't.

He would keep The Haunt if he was the only person who ever drank here. It's not about that.

It's about a loss of a whole other kind. The loss of the familiar company and the distraction he'd been hoping to find here, the hum of noise, a good time floating down from upstairs as he works in the office below.

The silence will just remind him she's not here.

"Planning to work?" The barman's voice breaks his thoughts.

He realises he's been resting his forearm on his laptop, running the pad of his thumb over the smooth corner.

"Yeah, I..." he trails off, not bothering, smiling as a idea forms. "I think my plans just changed. It seems I should go scope out the competition, introduce myself." He downs the shot he'd been poured, no longer nursing it.

He's not going to sit here and feel sorry for himself - he could have done that at home.

The barman nods, taking the glass Castle's just set back on the bar as he stands, rolling his shoulders and trying to shake off his string of bad luck.

Kate Beckett would be less than amused to find out he's spent the evening sulking in the corner of his own bar. Especially when she's stuck in the cramped confines of a motel room, locked away with gallows humour and no space of her own.

"Maybe I'll intimidate them a little, drop a few names." He winks at the younger man who knows he doesn't normally throw his weight around, not seriously anyways. He moves his eyes to his laptop.

"I can put that out the back if you'd like," he offers, apparently following Castle's line of sight, his thoughts, his reluctance to duck downstairs to stow it away.  
>He shouldn't take the kid up on his offer, should do it himself. Not for security reasons (though that <em>should<em>be why not), but because he may be the boss but this kid isn't his lackey.

He finds himself nodding anyway, agreeing. He's too keen to get out of this place, the solitude is too stark a reminder that she's not here celebrating a close with him or just wasting the evening away.

It's not a long walk, a chance to clear his head, untangle the tendrils of her from his thoughts.

Like that's _possible_ nowadays, in some way everything reminds him of her.

As Castle rounds the corner, sighing that she's slipped back in, too easily, he hears the thudding beat of the music and starts to feel the build of apprehension. It's rocky, which isn't a problem, he has moves-

Wait.

He groans at his own words, stops his monologue. He just aged himself so horrendously in his own head that it is shameful, humiliating.

He reaches the door, frustrated but now a sense of pride drives him forward, ignoring the obvious signs that this is not the kind of bar that someone who looks, acts and dresses like he does should be entering, not _alone_.

He shudders as he hears it, an echo of her voice. The way she would respond to this situation. Her voice in his head, as clear as day.

"Buck up, Castle. It's just a bar."

It spurs him on, the thrill, the forbidden sense of not belonging, of being unwanted. This is what he's been missing since she's been gone.

Not that she fights his presence any more, but he still doesn't truly belong, not on paper and not according to her Captain.

That's why he's here, wherever he is, in the first place and why she's there, wherever she is.

They remain separated. He has to avert his eyes, studying a wad on the pavement, unknown origin but completely revolting. Finally a distraction a puzzle he can solve.

Then he realises what it is: _nothing_. A blob on the gutter.

He flicks his eyes at the wheel, finding the like-colour. Black and black. The black blob and the black rubber of a tyre. He swallows as he realises (how he missed it he doesn't know) that on either side of the door, adorning the curb are rows upon rows of motorcycles,

lines of them. He blinks against the sight of the Harley's, soft-tails, some decaled with flames that look pretty cool and-

Wait.

He looks closer. There is a naked woman, twisted around the engine, with long flowing hair that...

Oh God.

Someone put the silhouette from his books onto a damn bike. Glossy and silver and stretched across the gas tank.

It's Nikki Heat, has to be.

She does look like Nikki, like Kate.

He swallows, hot images flood his mind and he averts his eyes and closes them for good measure against the vision of her, straddling one of the bikes. He's not even picturing her doing it _naked_.

Just her.

Her on the bike that he is still yet to see. Her muscular thighs wrapped around the cold dark metal of the bike as she rocks it and knocks the kick-stand.

The thrum of an engine close by sends his imagination further into overdrive, sinking him deeper into his thought, his... fantasy.

He shivers.

He can see her, a vision stepping straight from one of his fantasies, clad in one of her tight black leather jackets, high heel boots, managing to run in those spiked heels isn't her only skill, wearing them is a skill in and of itself. The dark denim jeans hugging every one of her barely-there curves, tight across her ass, nothing new but the shiny black helmet.

It's mysterious, intriguing and _hot_ as hell. He can see it, her face hidden by the dark visor, the wisps of her hair just poking out at the sides.

He clenches his fists. He has to physically stop himself shoving it into his mouth to stifle a groan at the image he can create.

Hell, what would the _reality _do?

She's always gone above and beyond his imaginings in everything else.

This would be no exception.

He has to see her on that bike. He needs to wrap his arms around her, pull her into his chest as she revs the engine and drops the clutch, kicking it into gear, bringing it to life beneath them. He wants to feel the heated engine vibrate through her and into him.

He wants on that bike.

Hell, he wants _Kate_.

But if the bike and a ride with her is the nearest he's going to get, he'll take it. He will pull her into the groove of his hips and press himself against her back, fit securely against every shaking muscle, holding on for dear life as he lets her drive him into oblivion, anywhere she wants to go.

God he needs a drink. He needs to get inside and distract himself.

But...

Just one more second to fantasise.


	3. Chapter Two

**Co-authored by kimmiesjoy and demuredemeanor**.

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><p><strong>Chapter Two.<strong>

_Anybody drinking here _

_is lucky just to leave here alive!_

Finally he finds some strength, a resolve strong enough, that he can bring himself to tear his eyes from the line of bikes. He can fantasise all he likes later, and he will, in the privacy of his own home.

But right now, he's being jostled by a tattooed man, making no apologises as he shoves him out of the way. He is in the way, standing stupidly blocking the door, waiting to get his ass kicked before he's even made it inside.

Hell, he's ogling some bike, imagining his partner straddling it with him.

He swallows.

If he's going to survive this bar and these bikers, god, if he is going to survive the images running rampant through his head, he has to focus.

He looks up at the building, cold, brown brickwork, and the simple lines of flashing red, neon, letters, spelling the name "Ace in the Hole."

It's the only indication this place is even a business, the only indication it's not some run down warehouse.

He snickers.

Well apparently it is a 'hole', it sticks in his head, it's such a cheesy name for a bar, but it's catchy, no class like 'The Old Haunt' but looking around _class_ wouldn't exactly fit in here, much like himself.

He darts his tongue out, touching it to his bottom lip quickly, flicks his eyes to share his wise-crack. But he's alone.

Why is somewhere so grungy and dingy looking, apparently, so popular?

What is the reason for its sudden success? Maybe the answer will be revealed on the other side of the door.

He fumbles an apology to the man he realises is staring at him, expectant. He avoids his eyes, careful, for once in his life taking caution and not throwing it to the wind.

The guy is freaking huge and Castle has no doubt he would take eye contact as a challenge, a confrontation.

Castle turns his back quickly, maybe stupidly, on the guy, and heads for the door. The bouncer doesn't stop him, but his chuckle is less than encouraging.

Castle pauses, taking a breath as he undoes the first button on his coat, heaving the door open with his other hand, heavy metal that forces him to grunt as he yanks and pulls it wide.

A gust of heated air hits him smack in the face as he walks through the door, it's stale, burns the back of his throat like the acrid fumes from one of his experiments with Alexis, as it settles over him, seeping into the depths of his lungs.

The scent of alcohol mixed through with copper, something sickly sweet.

He looks around, searching it out...

It's sweat, _human_ sweat.

The place is packed with heaving, pulsating, bodies that writhe in time to the thudding base guitar of the rock music, while others sit at tables, somehow ignoring the beat.

He looks around again, slowly, assessing the details. He takes in some of the shirtless clientele, the grime and grunge, the abundance of leather that make him realise he stands out.

Castle is a man of the world and he prides himself on being able to mix with everyone, drag people under his spell when he needs to, use his charismatic charm.

It's not always a pleasure, sometimes it's a barrier...

Here it's an impossibility.

He knows that in this bar he's closer to being thrown out on the street, missing a few teeth after a beating, than he is to being the life and soul of the party.

The sheer amount of people who should be in his bar start to piss him off, even if they look like extras from the worlds cheesiest biker gang movie, and wow that guy with the facial stud, yeah...no...he wouldn't mind skipping him, but the rest they look like perfectly decent...

Castle stops dead.

His eyes focus solely on the group gathered at the bar.

The cracked and ancient looking wood enhanced by the three women sitting on it. Two of them are clinking glasses, tipping back small shots of something that flashes blue with a flame before it hits their lips.

They cheer, glasses above their heads, and the group of men around then whoop appreciatively and raise the bottles again, refills.

He shakes his head but laughs, this is what he wanted, the escape, the noise and life. He needed the distraction.

He starts forwards again, moving to the bar, ignoring the looks and the comments that follow him, the raised eyes and snickers.

He skirts the edge of the room, moving along the wall and he catches sight of the other group, crowded closer together, obviously at a much _later_ stage of their night much too _early_.

They sit away from the other's, far enough to gain some privacy, close enough to suggest they were once part of the shots and giggles.

He eyes the third woman sitting on the bar now, her slender form, the curve of her arm and the long line of her bare legs, draped around a well-built guy, who hangs over her, all muscle through the shoulders as he flexes and leans closer.

Castle catches the shift of the man's hand, the way he slides it along the bar towards her, creeping closer, like the _creep_ he probably is.

But Castle smiles again as he realises, with her dark sweep of hair over one shoulder, hiding her face completely, this woman likes to do some creeping of her own.

Someone cuts in front of him and steals his attention.

He follows the mess of brown hair, long and loose, curling at the ends, and he swallows, shudders in shock, the desire to speak her name is overwhelming.

He wants to say '_Kate_', cross his fingers and toes, and prey she turns around.

Her hair is the right colour, he realises as she marches across the room, maybe a little duller, but that could be down to the crappy fluorescent lighting.

He follows her with his eyes as she moves, letting them roam over her shoulders, the arch of her back.

Even the leather jackets fits, matching one of the many worn by his partner. But then he has to check, has to look closer, maybe move closer.

He swallows like she'll kill him if she turns around and finds him ogling her ass, but he doesn't move and he lets his eyes linger over the sway of her hips and the swish of her hair before he diverts his attention back to the jacket.

He's sure he's seen that one before, even the movement of the loose flap as she dodges people is familiar. He tracks her, masterfully managing to keep hold of whatever she's carrying in her arms.

He steals a glance.

His eyes don't linger though.

It's not her.

Not even close.

He chews a lip in frustration. Damn now he isn't just _missing_ her, he's imagining her _everywhere_.

He swallows, finding his throat dry and decides he needs a drink and fast.

He starts moving towards the bar again and watches the couple trade a bottle back and forth, tipping as she drinks taking swigs of the liquor. Still unable to see her face he can tell by the shudder of her body she's giggling at the guy who holds her fixed attention.

He needs what they're having, all of it.

He averts his gaze, he needs a damn drink, except the only space at the bar is between that little intimate group he keeps staring at and the more, extroverted, flame drinkers.

He approaches with caution, watching the guy in the smaller group leering over the woman. Castle decides, of those assembled, he'd be the threat, the one to get aggressive if he moved too close.

Castle sits down two stools over from the short guy on the edge of their private party, his jacket pulled up to his ears, staring into his drink. Clearly he doesn't want to be here, but he's at the knee of the woman as she spreads herself further around the bigger guy and from the occasional grunts between the three of them Castle assumes they are together, friends.

Castle realises there is a difference in the look of this group compared to the rest in the bar. The guy standing looks well-muscled, toned, not a bulk like the other guys in this place, no beer gut or exaggerated physique, oh, and he's wearing a shirt.

Castle averts his eyes as the man reaches and gropes her bare thigh, his hand sneaking up as soon as he makes contact with her skin, climbing higher and higher, until it's almost indecent, fingers skimming the edge of her denim shorts.

Well, _barely_ shorts, closer to underwear the way they skim the narrow groove of her hips, but it's just that kind of place.

He watches her knee twitch, catches sight of her foot as she makes a graceful sweep and he watches her press the toe of her shoe into the back of his knee.

The hand was about to travel back up her thigh studying the expanse of skin, curious, but she's buckled his legs. He falls against the bar more, against her.

It's a deliberate move to stop the groping, and Castle smiles to himself.

God, he's _ogling_ the pair, he realises later than he should have, because he's amazed, stunned by the grunge of this place. Anyone would think he's never been to a seedy bar before.

But he has.

It's just... been a few years.

He came here to distract himself, find some new words, a little inspiration and he's not going to find it by labelling every single person in the room. None of them are his partner, not one of them his _muse_. Nobody measures up to her.

But this woman's legs are quite... entrancing.

Sleek, long and slender.

Just like Kate's.

Except... not quite.

They're too... dark. Too orange.

He doesn't consider the fact that she wouldn't be in a place like this, maybe at a wilder, earlier point in her life, a younger, more rebellious stage, but now... he's not sure.

But, thinking about it, _Beckett_ in a biker bar would be hot, and she would certainly hold her own.

And Beckett, perched on the edge of a bar, with bare legs and spiked heels, toned thighs wrapped around-

Wow.

He blinks, lets out a long breath and swallows.

He lets his eyes roam the legs of the woman in front of him, just for a second, letting himself pretend it's her.

If she can't be here to perch on the bar herself he can just imagine, for a moment, that the woman three seats over is Beckett and she's tilting her head and calling him over to settle between her legs, leer over her and whisper in her ear. She wants him to tell her _everything_ he'll do to her and all the things he wants her to do to him.

-Oh sweet Jesus.

A second has just become a fantasy he wont ever shake.

Another one stored away in the Kate Beckett vault.

He should have stayed staring at the cursor on his screen because the universe is a monumental bitch and karma hates him. There is no way in hell this is a chance happening, someone has to be playing a trick on him, because he is staring at her legs again and she is wearing Beckett's _boots_.

They're _her_ boots.

He'd know those boots if they came up and kicked him in the face. He scoffs because when they were _cuffed_ together, before the tiger part, they almost did hit him in the face.

His eyes are fixed on the heel of the shoe, travelling up the tight leather as it clings to every part of her calf.

This crazy bar-wench has Beckett's boots on.

Her kick-ass 'I'm going to catch every damn criminal in this city' boots.

He watches the woman flick her ankle again, realises that he's staring like some sick foot fetishist. Castle drags his eyes away because if the meaty guy wrapped around her catches him staring at the foot that's dangerously close to his posterior, Castle will find the fear of an ass kicking will be least of his worries.

He finally catches the eye of the bartender and orders his own shot from the gruff looking man. He knocks it back and feels the warm burn as the liquid hits his tonsils, cascading downwards.

He flicks his eyes to the side again, noticing the guy's hand dangerously high on her leg, as it skims the frayed edge of the material, fingers dipping under and running along her thigh.

Castle gulps and slams down his glass, he tries to turn his head away, and call for another shot but he hears the voice next to him, the large guy's throaty growl as he talks in hushed tones to the woman.

He catches the "_Anything_?" before it's followed by a laugh, too tight and strained.

It doesn't sit right with Castle.

Something about them is off.

He listens as the man mumbles something else and thumbs at the hem of her shorts again.

Now he knows something's off.

Her knuckles turn white as she grabs his hand, he watches her shake her head wishing he could see her face and read her expression, even without that he can tell she's clearly not loving it.

"_Leverage_?" the guy asks.

She nods and this time his hand on her hips is _allowed_, acceptable, wanted even, and Castle tips his head in confusion watching woman's foot slide.

Then Castles mouth drops open and his eyes widen further. In a joint move, the guys hoists her, an arm around her slender waist, and she pushes off with her foot, standing on his thigh.

If anyone happens to be watching this... _display_, he looks like he's jumping her down, lifting her from her spot on the bar.

But to _Castle_, it looks like they just raised her high enough to see over a few heads and survey the room.

Her hand hits the shelf of the bar above her head, a loud thump, drawing his attention to her properly.

Something furls in his stomach.

Castle stands from his seat, knocking the stool back, unsteady he wobbles, but it's not from the alcohol.

It's the feeling pounding through him.

It takes him by surprise and now he's not sure if he should intervene or get the hell out of here, but the decision is taken out his hands as the woman  
>sweeps her hair over her shoulder and lands.<p>

The minute her feet hit the gritty floor of the bar she spins out of the arms of the guy and straight into Castle.

"Training exercise my ass," he hisses at her, his voice a low growl, gruff.

He's taking in Esposito with his burly and unnecessary arm wrapped around Kates waist as he pulls her back, saving her from her unbalanced landing.

"C...Rick," she stutters, catching herself before she gives away too much of his identity.

His anger and jealousy bubble up, coursing through him strongly, so fiercely that some part of him thinks what happens next is a _good_ idea.

He shoves Esposito hard in the shoulder, dropping the clenched fists as he realises, he's angry at them _both_.

They're his team and part of his family, but that doesn't mean he doesn't feel it.

Esposito drops Kates waist and flicks his eyes from one to the other, watching the looks flashing between them, the communication.

Castle catches on quick, but he's still angry.

More than pissed off because now he has a whole _new_heap of questions and, stepping between the two of them, he lets all the rage and frustration he has been holding onto for the last four days, and if he's honest a lot longer, spill free.

He gestures between the two of them.

"What the hell is _this_?"

But what he's really asking is '_why didn't you tell me?_'


	4. Chapter Three

**Co-authored by **kimmiesjoy** and **demuredemeanor**.**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Three.<strong>

_Well she walks like a model and she talks like a trucker,_

_Doesn't wanna' lollipop but she sure loves a sucker_.

* * *

><p>She still has the glass bottle in her hand, the beads of condensation making it difficult to grip.<p>

She's sweating, her hands clammy from the heat of the bar.

Kate hears the door open and her eyes dart towards the sound, the bar is packed and it's hard to make out anything useful. The new comer moves and she can just make out his shoes.

Castles shoes, she pushes the pathetic-ness of knowing what _shoes_ the man wears out of her head as she tries to concentrate and catch a proper glimpse of the new arrival, after all it could be their guy.

But now Castle is in her head.

She misses him.

Even though it's only been a few days, he's her partner, her friend, her...

Whatever he is.

The man she's spent the last ninety-six hours really wanting to talk to.

She decides immediately the newcomer isn't their guy and leans into Espo to murmur that he doesn't need to bother shuffling her on the bar, making a show of getting repositioned.

She can stay focused on the man over his other shoulder.

The target.

Then her plan gets trampled over completely by those shiny Castley shoes because out of the corner of her eye, she spots him, the partner she's been missing too much, and she growls.

"Shit." Her hand tightens on Espositos shoulder where it had fallen when he lifted her.

She grips the glass, her efforts futile as it slides, she almost drops it and to an onlooker she looks too drunk.

Good.

That's probably all that's right with this situation at the moment.

"Problem?" Esposito asks, his voice a breath not even Ryan can hear. He's so attuned to her, tensing with her.

She's a quarter of the equation that makes up their team, she's his friend, and his partner and the minute she stiffens and starts cursing he knows it's go time.

Prepared and ready.

He lifts his hand from the bar and before she can manage to speak he's sliding it into his jacket. Seeking the only gun they'd dared bring with them.

Her voice is gruff, edgy when she speaks. "Castle."

Esposito's head snaps up, eyes finding hers and mirroring her own feelings, anger, confusion but mainly anxiety.

The man must have a death wish.

A lack of self preservation so strong that it draws him into places like this, into the middle of her undercover Op without even knowing how much danger he's in.

That or he's drawn to...Esposito eyes Kate as the thought sinks in, yeah moth to a flame.

Kate can't think straight. If she doesn't act fast, this will spiral rapidly, a vicious downward path none of them will emerge from.

Kate tilts her head to one side, letting her loose hair fall forwards, effectively hiding both her and Esposito, a barrier to stop him seeing them until they can make their escape.

They're teetering dangerously close to blowing their already paper thin cover.

Damn it.

Kate still has the glass bottle in her hand, the shared bottle of tequila that she and Espo were swigging from.

Only it's not tequila, it's water and all it serves as now is an icy reminder of the reality of the situation and she has to ditch it fast because Castle is moving again.

"Anything." Espo asks his fingers idle at her waist.

Kate glances, not convinced she wont look up straight into Castles eyes when she does, she shakes her head, not trusting her voice at the moment.

Crap.

The man is a fool. She shakes her head again, in annoyance, in disbelief, he's making for the bar, sitting less than three seats away, basically next to Ryan.

"Leverage?" Esposito doing his job, keeping her focused and Kate checks over his shoulder again.

Their guy is on the move so she grips tight to the Detectives shoulder and nods, a fast bob of her head, before he grabs her and she fakes a laugh, a drunken bar-slut giggle, then placing her boot on his thigh, she heaves her self up and scans the room...

Ha!

Kate Slaps her hand on the bar shelf in triumph.

Got him!

By the pool table, surrounding himself in a mixed group, ample cover, with jugs of beer and bottles littering the tables they claim, is Logan, his eyes flitting around as he takes in the bar, observing, with his group, but apart.

Shifty and suspicious looking as he watches the door.

Kate smiles, target re-acquired.

She lands, Espos hands on her waist as her feet hit the floor and she looks up straight into Castles face.

She can tell by his eyes, reading the hurt that registers within them, that he has taken in too much of what he saw and believed it.

Castle has seen everything and given in to his imagination.

He knows Javi well enough and he should damn well know her better than the way he's looking at them both.

He's burning up with it.

Jealousy.

Rage.

Castle looks like he's about to launch himself at Esposito. But as much Castle would have his heart in the right place, he looks like a bull in a china shop, swaying with the force of his feelings, one hand raised as he points, the other a fist clenched at his side.

He looks wild with it, the need and-

Not now.

Kate steps between them, shoves Castle and watches as his eyes snap to her, (wow the man really is a fool) bright and fiercely protective, his dilated pupils betray a possessiveness that Kate has never witnessed before, he seethes, actually exhales the flames of his anger through his clenched teeth as he stares her down.

She lets him step around her, stupidly, as her eyes flit to the bartender, a rough ape of a man who is suddenly wielding a bat. Kate's cop instincts kick in and she reaches behind her, her fingers falling to the space where her holster normally rests.

Only she doesn't have it, of course not.

A police issue side arm in a holster on her back would be a dead give away, she might as well have kicked the door down wearing her pant suit and flashing her badge.

A hand reaches for her from behind, catches at her groping fingers, stopping Kate from giving herself away as she searches for the non-existent weapon. She turns knowing it's Esposito backing her up, but Castle knocks his hand away again, what the hell is wrong with him?

"Don't touch her." he growls. The dark, commanding tone of his voice sets fire to her veins, leaves flames licking their way up her legs, but anger is raging in her head.

Kate can see the shift in body language, watching the men and knows Esposito will take a lot but the man isn't a push over and Castle seems to have come here tonight hell bent on finding trouble to ease his visible frustration.

"Bro, what is your problem?" Esposito barks shoving Castle back, a little male pride and ego, a little tit for tat.

Kate makes a noise of annoyance and moves to step between the two men, end this before it gets completely out of hand.

It's really pissing her off, but just as Kate steps forwards, intending to be a little heavy handed herself , relieving some of her own frustration, there is a deafening crash from behind that has her whirling on the spot with her arms raised in defence.

Kate Takes up a protective stance in front of the two men, without even thinking about it as her head snaps to the bar.

The bartender stands, bat raised and his eyes narrowed, his skull tattoo ripples across his bicep as he lifts the bat again and brings it down heavily, loudly, on the bar, another resounding crash that startles a few of those close, but doesn't penetrate far enough into the din of the heavy atmosphere to stop the place dead.

Luckily.

"Take it outside before I make you take it outside." He thumps his meaty fist down next to the bat, a double threat in the wood and the bone that Kate sees for what it is.

The perfect opportunity.

"Good idea." She glances over her shoulder, curls her arm through Espositos and is reaching to do the same with Castle, desperately wanting to get them both outside, when the bartender, the one man meat mountain, barks at them again. "You two are fine, he didn't pay yet."

There is no way to avoid it, no way to drag him with them without arousing suspicion and they have to leave Castle to the mercies of the bartender.

Kate kicks at Ryan's stool as she stalks past him, catching the sly, barely there, nod of his head.

Ryan's got his back.

Reassured, she stomps to the side entrance, Esposito in her wake, Kate rams down the metal bar and the door pops open with an audible whoosh, smacking her in the face with a blast of cold city air as she barrels out into the night.

It means nothing because she's pissed off, barely feels it and her eyes dart back to the door as it closes.

Now she's worried.

"Grope me more next time Espo jeeze," she stalks around him in the alley, her anger burning like brilliant bright flames, she's not entirely sure who she is angry with now though.

Kate wants Castle out here too, safe where she can see him, where she can yell at him, pull him close, have him

near, scream at him for his stupidity.

His doubt.

"I had to make it look real." Esposito snickers, folding his arms across his chest.

It's the laughter that does it, and, not caring who she's angry at anymore, Kate smacks Esposito, hard, across the back of the head "Do not make me tell Lanie where you tried to stick your hand Espo, I am nowhere near as scary as that woman is."

Esposito rubs the back of his head frantically with his hand "Jeez Beckett. It was joke...you know I would never... I mean you and Castle are..."

"Her and Castle are what?"

The voice booms through the doorway as he appears and Kate glares at him, not a classic Beckett death stare, a whole other realm of anger in one look that blazes at him.

Him there in the doorway.

The true source of her frustration.

Her worry.

Kate clenches her fists at her side, nails digging into her palm, watching as Ryan finally appears behind him.

If Esposito doesn't answer Castle soon she's going to leave Ryan to pull them apart, turn away and not look back.

This is not what she signed up for.

She will happily abandon their tentative cover for the sake of her team.

Then she'd abandon them, leave them in this alley to hash it out while she goes home and draws herself a bath. Some normality amongst the drama, danger and madness. The warmth and comfort of home so much more alluring than a dank and dingy motel room.

Kate lifts her head and finds Castle staring at her, the weariness leaves her in a heartbeat when she finds his eyes in the darkened alley.

"Partners," Esposito offers lamely. His voice means nothing now, he and Ryan may as well not even be here as they watch the flow of charged energy, crackle like static, back and forth between the other two.

"Is that what we are?" Castle queries, his eyes anchored to hers, darkly drinking her in, his smirk not one of amusement or even flirtation.

Kate is grateful Esposito hasn't gone where they all thought he was going, where she and Castle are dancing around heading.

It would be too much to deal with now.

Hell its too much to deal with day to day, but at least in the sanctuary of her routine she can take steps to being with him. Having him.

Loving him.

She exhales heavily, puffs out her cheeks, not caring that the noise draws the attention of the men, not caring if it shows her exasperation.

She drags her eyes back to Esposito, no more death glares, she gives him a nod, the man deserves a break.

Castle is angry enough for the both of them.

It's like he thinks there's still some battle he has to fight, some war to wage and win as he convinces her there is no other love she should be searching for. He is in full body armour raging for nothing, because he has already won.

She's battled, fought, argued and convinced herself enough.

He just doesn't know it and that's Kates fault.

She cant work out how to tell him, how to show him...

"Yeah well..." She flicks her eyes back to Castle, finds him watching her. She doesn't have any more to offer, nothing else to contribute, his gaze burns her with the ferocity of feeling as he waits on her.

Again.

"Okay, we need to move this down the alley." Ryan, ever the voice of reason, ushers his partner away. The boys exchange hushed whispers as they disappear into the shadows, and both Castle and Kate catch the tail end as they leave. Something about 'giving them a minute and he'll be apologising'.

She smirks and he glares and that makes her angry, the feeling surfacing again, but no...no that's not enough.

She's livid. Furious with him and herself, mainly herself.

"Do you have any idea the level of danger you put us in?" she turns away, her hair wrapping itself around her face in a lethal swish, but she's too full of rage to stalk off and she turns back "The danger you put yourself in?" She opens her mouth, closes it again with a snap before anything can spill out against her will. She narrows her eyes at him, scrunches her lips against the curse that lurks behind them, at the edge of her tongue and does the only thing she can think of.

She pokes him.

_Hard_.

Every vibe, ever ounce of anger and frustration and worry she channels to the tip of her finger and jabs him with as much force as she can muster, right in the chest.

It hurts.

They both jump back as she shakes her finger and he rubs his chest with a whimper.

"Ow Beckett, jeez," Castle gasps as he rubs at what will eventually be a bruise.

The anger drops off with the sharp pain in her finger and instead she shakes her head "You and Esposito going at it in that bar could have ended badly Castle."

He hears the soft truth hidden in the words as she speaks. She was worried about him, about her team, and...hurt he doubted her?

"I know, Kate." He doesn't apologise, she doesn't expect him to and she doesn't need it, but the feeling is behind the words, laced with emotion.

She drops her hand.

He forges ahead.

"This place is competition for the Haunt. I was just sussing it out."

The fact he was missing her, feeling unneeded and hurt, goes unsaid. Like it always is, it's easier to skirt the issues and leave the real meanings to float in the depths of his eyes.

Kate can feel it though, every unsaid emotion that emanates from him, just as easily as he reads her. Something glides through the conversation, ebbs in the rhythm and flow, the nuance of their speech, each so attuned to the other that they pick it up without even having to try.

She knows what he is saying without words, but they still refuse to acknowledge it.

"Really?" Kate tries to sound like she cares about the competition, but she's questioning that he missed her, because she missed him...so much.

She steps closer.

"How was I meant to know you guys would be here? You could have told me, I could have helped."

This time he moves, steps forward so that they stand opposite each other, barely a breath apart.

"Secret mission Castle." She smiles at him but it's probably the most truthful thing that she has said in awhile, a simple acceptance about the rules she follows daily in her job, the ones she inflicts upon herself and the personal mission she is undertaking to be more than she is, for him.

Her hand raises as his drops, fingers reaching for each other at the same time, a reassuring touch so much easier than words, and suddenly they are clinging to each others arms.

The door behind them opens and she whirls on the spot, coming face to face with the bartender, still wielding his bat.

Castles hand tenses and he tries to pull her backwards, but the man speaks before he has a chance.

"Get your ass back in the bar Beckett. Your guy's on the move."


	5. Chapter Four

**Co-authored by **kimmiesjoy** and **demuredemeanor**.**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Four.<strong>

_They're closin' in around her,_

_I'm cuttin' to the front of the line!_

* * *

><p>"What guy? Who?" Castle spins on the spot to face her, knowing he shouldn't be asking, he should be blindly following her, trusting she knows how to keep them both safe.<p>

Because she does, she always has and she always will.

"Our target, Castle. We're not just here for fun." She bites the words at him, regrets it immediately because she knows he knows that and the additional presence is throwing her off.

She bites her lip.

Makes the decision.

She turns back to face the surly barman. "Can you give me one second, Mick?"

"One. Second." The way he punctuates each syllable makes Castle swallow and turn his eyes back to the flash of hair as she spins back towards him.

She steps close, crowds into his body. Her beautiful eyes ferocious with anger at being ordered around, menacing, until they meet his and then they clear, resigned as she prepares to fill him in, bring him in.

One of the team.

She doesn't clear it with Mick, but there is something in the nod, the lift and angle of her chin that Castle reads for what it is, a command, Castle's in.

No arguments.

Tough shit.

Let that information feedback to whoever's in charge and she'll deal with the consequences later.

He watches her and he stops breathing, she just steals the breath right out of his lungs without doing anything other than turning to face him.

His eyes focus darkly on her lips as she wets them quickly with her tongue, before taking a deep breath, sucking across the smooth slippery skin, preparing.

But Castle isn't at all prepared for the way it swoops through him.

He wants to kiss her.

He wants to slant his mouth over hers and steal the words with a deep, penetrating, swirl of his tongue. He wants to lift her leg and clutch at the warm skin of her thigh as he drives her back into the wall of alleyway.

He wants to steal more than words, he wants to steal...

But then it's too late.

She's already talking.

"Tommy Logan is a regular here-"

"Already?" he interrupts, but his mouth snaps shut at the narrowing of her eyes.

Okay, this is an abridged version.

She's giving him the rundown before she takes him in there, drops him into the middle of whatever this is.

Castle understands. He shuts up.

She continues, as if she was never interrupted, as if she didn't just take a moment to give him a few death threats with her steely gaze, the angle of her chin and the line of her face.

He still wants to kiss her.

Maybe even more than before. When she looks like that, Castle told her before she was cute when she was angry, that's crap. She wasn't cute, she was hot, a roaring inferno of sexual frisson, desire and heat...

But she's talking, and he should be listening.

"-but he's not our main target. He's interested. Vice have heard buzz that he's got feelers out, seeking some assistance with a shipment, a huge delivery. We're here waiting for Vince DiSilva. He's got an offer Logan can't refuse."

"What is it?" He's intrigued, caught up in her story, waiting for the cover.

"DiSilva has a few... problems he needs taken care of." her voice drops, low, dangerously so, he knows that tone, the one that will brook no teasing, her dedication to the task, her belief in the sacredness of life shine through and Castle understands immediately.

"People?" he asks quietly.

"Yeah," she says softly. He watches the flick of her eyes, so quick they're barely there - but they are. She swallows around the thought before she continues, now that she's checked they're not being overheard. "He's had a few incidents, people are snitching on him. Narcotics are closing in on him fast, but they can't get him for the drugs."

She opens her mouth to carry on but he takes over, finishes her train of thought. "So they're trying to nail him for murder before he commits it?" he asks quickly, joining jagged pieces together.

"Exactly. But the thing is-"

"Tell me later," he steps closer, touching a hand to her hip to guide her forwards, back into the bar. "Because right now, our guy could be getting away."

She turns, into his hands, slightly shocked by his sudden encroachment into her personal space, but she stops for half a second, letting him catch-up, letting him fall into position, both of his hands now circling her hips, before they head back inside.

Castle watches, fascinated, impressed, his eyes glued to Kate as she resumes her cover, mentally and physically, her posture changes, her smile drops off, kinks to one side and she leans back into the feel of his hands at her waist.

She pulls the false persona over her, wrapping it around her, then she does the same with Castle, letting herself melt into the angles and curves behind her, his body a part of her facade.

When she reaches the door he snakes an arm across her stomach, pulling her right back to his chest, a safe distance from the door his other hand has swung open.

"We've got to blend in right." He's telling her not asking, his fingers moulding perfectly over the bones of her pelvis, flicking at the edges of her tank top.

He knows she understands what he's saying. He needs to replace Esposito, be her partner here. He won't step back and let Espo resume the role. Nor will anyone else be offering their services.

Not in this grimy place.

Certainly not anywhere else.

Kate nods, she can't really do anything else because she basically declared this is the way it would be in the alley, she stood her ground with Mick in some silent battle that Castle almost missed.

She nods, then she smiles again and starts leading him further into the bar, winding through the people, dodging tables and waitresses with trays.

The hum of the place has changed, everyone is buzzing and he doesn't know why.

It's gotten busier, for sure. But that's not the cause of the hum, they've missed something.

It's his fault.

He quashes the thought and takes another step, wanting to direct her to a booth in the corner. No more leering from the bar, that's too much, too tempting.

But he feels Kate tug him the other way, towards the crowds of people, the hearty hum from the area they had not long vacated.

He doesn't fight her but he does pull her in closer.

He feels the second she hits the bar with her hip before she spins in his arms, and leans into his neck, mouth at his ear. "You've got to lift me up," she explains.

But she's not really explaining anything. That statement makes no sense.

"Why?" he asks, stupidly, feeling he must have missed something. But Castle doesn't hesitate and grips her hips firmly in his hands, waits for her to settle her hands on the edge of the bar, ready to pull herself back as he lifts her upwards.

"It's some unwritten rule. Mick had to explain to Espo," she speaks quickly and quietly, muttering 'Neanderthals' under her breath. He shouldn't be able to hear her with the pounding beat and bass guitar, the hum of activity and the sudden clanking of glass, but he can hear every word that slips past the curled edge of her mouth.

Either he's used to it already or she is skilled at this.

He'd put money on the latter.

"I'm staking my claim, aren't I?" he asks as the realisation dawns on him, only the slightest hint of a tease in his voice.

He watches her swallow as he steps forward, little effort required as he lifts her, fingers tight to her waist, soft beneath his fingertips in a way that clenches tight in his stomach.

She feels good.

He hears the slight gasp when he lifts her, quickly setting her on the edge, but he's sure to be gentle, considerate, and he ignores the noise that their connection pulled from her.

"Yeah," she huffs as he sets her down, fingers possessive and reluctant to leave her. Now he's touching her Castle doesn't want to let her go, he is still reeling from the fact she didn't fight him, didn't lift herself like he expected.

She let him stake a claim.

A completely different claim than the gesture entails, her hand closing subconsciously over his where it rests on the hem of her shorts. In some twisted way, she just told him, let him show the scum residing in this bar, that she is his.

He steps between her legs, pressing her knees a little wider to fit between them, heat under his fingers as they twitch on her waist, eager to touch more of her.

"Where's our guy?" he asks, needing the distraction, as his eyes lift and find her scanning the room, short quick gazes, seeking and searching.

He sees the second she spots Logan.

He fights not to look too, it doesn't take much, his willpower focused more on not pulling Kates lithe body against his and mounting the bar to kiss her. Castle settles instead on just leaning in close and whispering against her cheek, trying to ignore the warmth and inviting closeness of her skin.

He can do this.

They can do this, because he is pretty certain, from the bright pink streak across her cheeks and the way she is keeping her gaze deliberately focused over his shoulder, that she is feeling it as much as he is.

Together they can survive this... closeness. They will come out better partners, more attuned to one another.

He's been handcuffed to this woman for God's sake, almost drowned in a car. They faced tigers and stopped World War Three. He's fought with her, for her and she's fought for him too.

Saving his life, saving him and saving him again by staying alive.

"You found him," he observes, letting her know that he understands.

"Now we keep him here," she decides, her fingers squeezing over his hand.

Then she's withdrawing, pulling back from him, leaning far enough over the bar that Castle grabs her, holding her steady as she flicks her eyes to Mick.

Apparently she's been communicating with him all evening, probably all the previous ones too, because all she has to do is catch Mick's eye and give the most subtle of nods.

Then she brings a bottle over the bar, the half drunk bottle, resuming their cover by unscrewing the top again, and taking a swig as she turns.

He dodges the cool glass as she swings back around, but as soon as she's back in position he moves in close again, watching the line of her throat as she drinks carefully, clenching her jaw with each gulp like it's burning her throat.

She's good.

And Castle's mesmerized.

But then she lifts her eyes up to him and lowers the bottle, tipping it forwards, almost an offer to share.

That's not what it is though.

She flicks her eyes down the bar. Not to Mick, not to their guy but to the next group along. Kate is showing him something, but he is distracted by the group drinking.

That reminds him, where are the boys?

Castle doesn't get the chance to ask her though because Kate's withdrawn the bottle again and is staring at the taps a little further down, like she's reading them, entranced by them.

But she's not, she's got something on her mind.

She's waiting and he's so confused, because he missed her signal and, that doesn't happen often and Castle desperately seeks another one.

He can't keep his eyes off the line of her face.

"The boys?" he asks quietly.

She doesn't even acknowledge that she's heard him, and he thinks she hasn't. Castle moves closer, preparing to ask again, whisper into her ear if he has to.

"Booth," she answers with a swallow, still focused on the bar." Third from the corner on the side wall." He realises, from this position, she's his eyes and he's her protection, her excuse to stare around the room longingly.

As if he's laid a claim and she can let her eyes rove the room like she's looking for her next target, her next conquest.

She's looking for the target, not the conquest, he knows.

It's a feeling, a heat emitting from her body he can almost taste on the tip of his tongue, it radiates from her. She wants him here and no one else is welcome. Now he's just got to hope they don't receive a rude interruption, that no one crashes this party and that they can work in peace.

Pft.

Castle almost laughs, this isn't work.

Oh, he made the noise. Out loud.

He pft'ed.

He realises it when she flicks her eyes back to him, narrowed with a hint of humour, but Castle can see something else there too, the certainty behind the gaze, he's just about to ask how they keep their guy here, what she's already planned when-

There is a loud clanging on the bell behind the bar.

"Shots!" Mick hollers.

The cry carries through the bar and everyone falls silent, nodding, agreeing as they move en masse. Well at least those who don't have drinks and aren't already balanced at the bar's edge do.

Oh, he gets it now, this will keep their guy here, a nice little distraction.

Kate's already on the bar and they have drinks. Castle turns back to her to steal the bottle, to take his shot, but she meets his eyes and he knows in that second he's not seeing everything, not understanding something.

God, what is wrong with him tonight?

Castle steals another look at Kate, he watches her lip turn white as she bites it, hard, teeth marring the edge of the tender, soft skin. Then it's gone, she's moving away from him, pushing at his shoulder as she rearranges herself.

Castle watches her close her eyes and swallow, moving further back onto the bar.

Clearly he is still missing something, something big he realises, as he notices several other women hopping up onto the bar, and men descending all around them. He watches his partner lower herself back, resting on an elbow and suddenly the undercover persona is very much in charge.

He watches her take over.

Kate smiles and beckons him forward with a crooked finger and a sly tilt of her head, completely throwing him off. Castle hears the audible groans around him and realises she just made a conscious choice to pick him over the apes crowding around.

She flicks her jacket aside, finding the edge of her shirt with her fingers, skimming the too-tight tank he's been watching all night, studying how it sticks to her body, how it hugs her slender frame, like he wants to, and shields her from the dirt and grime of this place.

But it's not anymore, because she's lifting it, exposing herself to the bars seedy underbelly.

He meets her eyes and swallows himself catching on.

Not just shots.

Body shots.

Of course this would be that kind of place.

Castle watches as she sets herself up, offers herself to him, obviously, not one of the many descending vultures, creeps or cretins that inhabit the place.

Okay, he can do this.

He nods to her, tells her he understands, but he also wants to apologise, almost as much as he wants to hop the bar and skim her skin with his lips.

But she's back on her elbow again, leaning over the bar to grab something he can't see.

Then he realises.

This was her plan, to distract Logan with shots.

So many shots.

He sets a hand at her hip, as he moves to stand over her. If he's going to do this he's not going to have an audience, and Ryan and Esposito certainly won't be watching. He will block her from as many of the patrons as possible, this isn't some stage show, some moment tainted by gallows humour.

She sets the bottle on her stomach and he watches her inhale and exhale, the steady rise and fall curling around the glass, hugging the base.

The noise of the bar has fallen away, cheers and groans from other men unheard by his ears.

No one is leering over them, watching them, cheering them on. As far as the rest of the bar is concerned she's already his.

If only they knew.

She groans in frustration.

"Rick," she bites, terse and short. She's telling him to get on with it. Suck it up, literally.

He nods once and grabs the salt shaker, his fingers grazing the sweat moistened muscle of her abdomen and Castle feels her shiver, watches her swallow and then she's still beneath him, no more steady rise and fall.

She's stopped breathing.

Their eyes catch and hold for half a second before she gaze deviates to the tiny salt shaker in his hand.

He's supposed to wet the line he lays the salt along, and it would mean trailing his tongue over the soft curve of her stomach, but he doesn't need to, Castle can see the lines of sweat, the trails of moistened heat that trickle across her skin.

He doesn't need the salt, or the excuse, he just wants to lick her.

Castle trailed the tip of the shaker across her skin, starting just below her bra, nudging her shirt higher, making the line longer than it needs to be.

Why not, right?

He has to play it up, just in case someone's watching. It doesn't seem like she's going to object, Castle feels a twinge at his conscience as he realises she can't object.

It would call attention to them.

He looks away, dragging his eyes from her exposed body and up to her face, surprised by what he finds.

Her eyes are open, wide, locked on his fingers, and her mouth, those soft and swollen looking lips are parted as she huffs heated air across them. She looks like she's fighting to focus, her cheeks are pinking up rapidly and she looks delectable.

Castle can't help it, as her eyes lift and meet his, he licks his lips, because she is delectable and any second now, provided she doesn't stop him, he will get a little taste.

And he's feeling confident now because the way she still hasn't moved, hasn't made a sound tells him, the way her breath is panting hard from her chest everything about the way she is reacting tells him she won't stop him.

She can't stop him, not here.

The salt shaker comes to a stop at the edge of her belly button, and Castle reaches past her for the tequila bottle, Kate takes him by surprise.

Again.

She grips the salt shaker still in his hand, her fingers sliding into his, wrapping together around the tiny glass container as she seeks to pull it away from him. Heat and the electricity that is them, all pour through the touch.

Castle trades off with her, letting Kate pull the salt away from him and dropping herself back onto the hardwood of the bar, her arm falling over her eyes.

Clamping one of his own large hands to her hip to hold her steady, Castle feels her hiss as he pours the fluid as carefully as he can into her belly button. The small hole fills in a second and the excess slides over her skin.

He tries to ignore the way the flowing liquid slides over her stomach, disappearing down, behind her back, while the majority ventures south, over her hips, disappearing darkly into the line of her shorts. He wants to press his mouth at the hem and suck the liquid from the denim, suck on her, draw her up against him and...

He sets the bottle back on the bar and slides his hand beneath her, feels her arch slightly at the wet contact. Hot fingers and cold liquid fire sliding against the curve of her back.

His arm is shaking, but not from her weight.

He feels giddy, but not from the alcohol.

Kate Beckett is arching into him, raising herself high on the bar and pulling him closer, her arm catching at his bicep to hold him in place and it's not even an act, no longer a show.

Castle can tell by the groan that leaves her lips and the whimper that quickly follows.

He puts his nose to her stomach, testing, showing her where he's going to start. Telling her that he'll follow the line, toe it even, let her lead even as he lays over her body and his mouth descends.

Then he opens against her skin, wet and hot, his tongue there immediately, lapping at the twang of the salt.

No more warnings.

He meets her eyes, watches her clamp them shut in response as he trails his mouth over the salt, inhaling deeply the scent of her hot skin.

He's not thinking about consequences right now, he's not even thinking that he should be, Castle is so focused on the taste of her beneath his mouth and the way she ripples in response that everything else fades away.

He moves his mouth along the line, the salt dancing over his tongue isn't even relevant, because she moans again, sending him another undercover message.

She's not thinking about the consequences either, and suddenly she's got her fist in his hair ,gripping too tight, but good, so good, he moans in appreciation, growls into her, pressing his tongue against her harshly, chasing the movement with edge of his teeth when he feels her nails at his scalp.

He stops a second when he feels it, taking the time to exhale harshly against the wet skin. He knows his breath is hot but her skin is hot too, just not quite the same now that a line of his saliva trails across her.

He sees the tiny ripple instantly, the air cooling over the wet line causing the twitch as she fights another shudder, begging her body not to betray her.

He inhales again, drawing the cool air over her skin. But she's mastered it now, no quiver, no waiver. She's on top of it, pretending she's in control. But that's making it more obvious to him, more enjoyable.

Like she's trying to coat her arousal from these people, and from him, like she wants to wait until she has a chance to get him back into the alley and exact her revenge.

Suck on him for a while.

Lathe her tongue over his sweat dampened body and make him groan in frustration.

The skin slides into his mouth, salt forgotten as he sucks hard, nipping. He hopes she marks easily when he presses his teeth into her, Castle wants Kate to be reminded, wants her to catch it in the mirror and her step to falter when the memory crashes over her.

Castle nips again, determined, and this time the quiver isn't shrouded. It's open and honest. Castle knows even the drunkest of the buffoons could have caught her hitched breath, the undulation of her hips against him, the way they are wrapped around each other.

They're probably the most obvious thing in the room.

He takes his mouth from her skin, just dragging at it like he has all day, his tongue stealing the last inch of salt.

No more show.

No more teasing.

But so much more Kate.

He wants to look up at her as he closes his mouth around her belly button, sucking deeply, drawing the tiny portion into his mouth, but he can't.

Alcohol or not, it burns his mouth.

The taste of her is burning his mouth.

His fantasy all too real and she's scalding his lips.

He wants to continue, steal the water from across her stomach, trail a lazy path over the smooth skin and taunt muscle until the only dampness is from his mouth.

But he can't, this is a shot.

Lick, sip, suck, and they have already dragged this out far longer than the rest.

Lick, sip, suck.

Crap.

It hits him.

The lime.

She didn't give it to him.

He tears his mouth from her stomach and bites down on his lip, searching for the lime on the bar.

It has to be authentic, right?

She wouldn't have forgotten-

Ouch!

She's dragging him up. Fingers at his ear, pinching, the other hand still tugging on his hair as she pulls.

He stops fighting it and moves with her, follows her lead, meeting her eyes.

Fuck.

She's got it in her mouth.

It's a wedge, a chunk of lime so useless it's pitiful. But it's everything it has to be for this, even if he doesn't need it.

But he's has to take it.

Then she's holding him against her, bringing his lips to her mouth, but leaving him to hover there for a second, giving him back the control, urging him to put her out of her misery.

But he can't.

He flicks his eyes to hers and she raises a brow, a challenge or a warning.

Maybe it's a command.

Get on with it.

He touches his lips to the fruit, slow, cautious and fleeting.

Their lips brushing briefly, a trail of heat against wet warm flesh, his teeth grazing her mouth, gentle as he seeks out the fruit.

Castle watches her close her eyes, he's glad, feeling her shiver against him, the edge of her tongue meeting his bottom lip as she pushes the fruit into his mouth, just for half a second.

He slides his over the wedge, dragging over the smooth contours of the fruit, the tiny tendrils of the citrus pulsating under his lips. It's harsh, sour and stinging.

But not soothed by her tongue, instead feels hers drawing back.

Clearly he's picked up her habit, worrying his lips in his teeth without realising it, huffing out a breath as he smiles around the lime and she makes a noise, the corner of her mouth twitching.

He slides the offending piece of fruit into his mouth quickly, completely, trying to avoid biting down. He wants to watch her smile, not screw his face up at the sour taste. He wants to be alone with her, very, very alone with her.

But they aren't. His hands spanning her waist don't seem to be aware of that fact though as they squeeze tighter, pull her closer so he can...

Something heavy slams into his head with a loud metallic crack and he jumps. Kate does too, but she doesn't look worried, in fact she's smirking.

What the-

He lifts his eyes from her face to the offending noise, the offending thump against his skull.

Mick.

He will kill this man.

Well...

No, he won't.

He called for shots (at Kate's request) so he gets to live, but if he's going to interrupt like that, slap him on the head with a tray, then he might wind up hurt.

Kate slides her hands along his forearms, moving from the grip on his wrists.

Wait, when did she move her hands to his shoulders?

Who cares.

It doesn't matter.

Mick waves the tray in front of him again.

"Spit," he commands.

Oh. That makes sense and is actually quite helpful.

He obeys and she shifts beneath him, curling her body around his and forcing her face into his neck.

"Castle," she says softly, reminding him, jolting him from a world that is much too foreign for his liking.

"Right, sorry." But he's not, in fact he is a lot of things, delighted, achy, turned on mainly, but sorry is about as far from the list as you could get.

He lifts his body from over hers, so she can sit in front of him again. His arms suddenly devoid of purpose, there is too much distance between them now and Castle watches as she tugs on her shirt, covering herself. But the image, burned into his mind will taunt him for weeks, the taste will last longer on his tongue.

That taste of lime a mockery of everything that passed between them, the taste of her a hint of so much more, but not enough.

He settles back on the balls of his feet.

But then she slides her hands over his forearms. Her grip is tight, through his shirt, as she rights herself on the bar again, coming in close, apparently also dissatisfied by their lack of proximity.

She's closer, it's dragged her closer. But then her mouth is at his ear and he stops breathing, stops thinking.

She makes a noise, a hitch in her throat as she exhales.

"He's on the move." Her voice has a husk he hasn't heard before, so open and raw.

She's aroused.

But wait, who's on the move?

It dawns on him. They're working.

Pft, _work_.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Sorry for the delay guys, but we do hope this makes up for it ; )**


	6. Chapter Five

**Chapter Five.**

_"She's gotta' holda' me and ain't lettin' go!_

_And I can't get enough of the things that she does!"_

* * *

><p>Castle is holding her too tightly. Mmm, not tight enough. God, not nearly close enough when he pulls her up again. She can still feel the trail of his lips across her stomach, the burn that lingers across her skin.<p>

With his large hands spanning her hips and digging into the soft flesh still exposed from when he pulled at her top, Kate straightens with a whoosh of air, hot and bothered from her mouth to his face.

Noses nearly brushing, Kate can feel the trail of his breath across her lips.

They stir the atmosphere, or maybe they create it. The thick clouds of tension that had cast itself over them from the day they met, have parted briefly. For a fleeting moment, Castle's mouth has finally tasted what was always just out of his reach.

Kate shivers at the thought of the fire they could ignite with just a bit more. Oh, so much_ more_ friction and there would be no going back.

Thinking about it now, with her in a sitting position, just the feel of Castle dragging her closer, raises the need inside her so she wraps her legs around his waist, knees firm to his ribs, hands free to roam his shoulders.

She's higher than him, kind of soaring on the rush. Actually, her head feels fuzzier than it would have if she'd been downing real tequila and not water.

But, because she still sits on the bar, she's literally raised above him. She's at the right height for Castle's face to be level with her chest, and deliciously close to the hollow of her neck.

Kate keeps her eyes over his shoulder tracking their suspect as best she can. But he's still touching bare flesh. Still breathing heatedly into the curve of her throat. Still dragging her forwards totally unaware of the way the denim shorts are riding up, slipping against her thighs.

Maybe he can't see the rise of heat in her cheeks as she remembers his lips on her stomach, as she fights not to beg him to pull her top up again. Up higher this time, and over her head. She wants him to crush his mouth against the cotton of her bra, drag at it with his teeth...

Kate gasps, a small shudder rolling through her body at the visions burning in her mind. She tries to push it away, hide the quiver of her skin from him. Breathe it all away on the exhale of air that leaves her chest. It's not convincing to anyone, least of all herself.

Kate's eyes stare, but don't focus. She forces them to, properly now when she realises the target is relocating. Her fingers tense against Castles bicep. She feels his head lift and watching how hard he finds it to drag his eyes from the bare skin below his fingers.

He's feeling it too. Of course he is. So much more attuned to the ebb and flow between them, Castle plays with it and teases at it so much more freely than she does. So of course he's feeling it too.

But as he opens his mouth to say the things he's always held back, she beats him to it. Only dragging them both out of their fantasy and back to reality.

"He's on the move."

She mentally curses the jagged edge of arousal that emanates from her lips. It's hot and leading and far too tangible for her liking.

She can feel it and she really wants Castle to taste it, but now isn't the time; they're working.

Castle looks confused, his eyes narrowing briefly before realisation hits him. He makes a noise, a sound of derision that says everything she is feeling, every ache and longing and annoyance at the case that drags them away from the feel of each other.

"You need to...jump me down again." Kate hums as she leans into him. Her voice has lost the hard edge now, the cutting bite of sex.

But Kate knows her tone still betrays her when Castle invades further into her space. It's more fluid, rolling off her in waves when his fingers squeeze her waist again.

Kate rocks forward, preparing to move, catching Castles eye.

Oh god.

He can read every beat and pulse, everything that sits in her dilated pupils and with one swift shift he pulls her forwards.

Kate feels her thighs clench tight on either side of his large muscular chest.

Against her will.

Naturally.

Castle's lips kink to one side as he smiles.

"Not a problem."

His thumbs slide up, over the black tank top and stop just at her ribs, running the stretch of material that sits at the bottom edge of her bra.

Kate gasps again, hissing a breath that she sucks through her teeth and pitches forward. She pushes her body more firmly into the feel of his dangerously arousing hands, the trickling trail of his fingers. Relishing the way Castle meets her in the movement, both drawn dangerously close to the flame they ignite.

He lifts her high, a lot higher than necessary, and Kate can tell as he moves Castle is proving a point. His chiselled arms hold her above him as if her weight means nothing, making her cling to him again before he lowers her. Slowly and surely in one smooth and gliding motion, she eases down the long, lean, hard line of his body.

It takes a year for her feet to touch the floor, her eyes burning into his for the entire deadly journey down to hell. Or heaven, she isn't quite sure. It's too hot for heaven and no where near stimulating enough for hell.

She raises her eyes, responds to his dirty smile with one of her own before she pushes him away.

The laugh that comes out is too shaky to her to be convincing. She's going for effect, the bar slut playing with men. But it doesn't really work as she fights not to stumble. He turned her legs to jelly just by running his tongue over her stomach, if he licked elsewhere...

Detective mode kicks back in almost instantaneously when she realises she can no longer see Logan. She takes three striding steps before she feels Castle's hand snake around her waist, his lips at her ear startling her again.

"Side exit?"

Oh.

She turns and catches sight of the door closing. She curses under her breath as she turns to follow, shifting past the pool table but keeping Castle securely attached as she heads after her suspect.

There is a crash from behind, the sound of broken glass and angry shouts. They turn as one towards the noise, breaking their salacious reverie as they seek the source of the disturbance.

With her fingers at his wrist, keeping him close, and Castle's arm across her waist they stand prepared, but not ready for the sight that confronts them.

Spilled drinks and broken bottles litter the floor. Upended trays and, apparently, a drunken stumbling Ryan attracting a lot of attention.

Castle doesn't know where to look, not wanting to give Ryan away by staring, but not wanting to attract attention by not looking.

He glances at Kate, deciding to follow her lead. She stares so he joins in and watches, attentively, as Ryan stumbles into another waitress and yet another tray of drinks crashes to the floor. He catches the almost glare of annoyance behind Ryan's drunken play acting.

Kate laughs and he catches on, it's code "Esposito's got him?"

She nods.

Esposito is following the suspect, they didn't lose him after all.

Looking up as she watches Castle's eyes narrow in confusion before he shakes his head "You guys have some weird signals Kate."

She smiles widely, leaning in closer so they can't be overhead "It gets boring in a motel room on an undercover-op Castle, there's not much to do besides prep and make things interesting." She smiles at him again "You'd probably love it."

Castle opens his mouth to tell her it does sound cool, like playing spy. He wants to tell her how much more fun they would have had if he had been the one trapped with her for a week, but her hand on his chest silences him.

"Is Ryan giving that guy the finger?"

Castle follows her line of sight, whoa, "Yeah...god yeah he is...Ryan is...damn you guys are good at undercover."

"Shit," she mutters.

"What?" he looks at her again, confused.

"I gotta go call Gates."

* * *

><p>They exit the bar, wrapped in each other at Kate's insistence, Castle's hands around her waist again, squeezing unconsciously at her hips. His body is a tense and vibrating wall of muscle at her back when he crowds her out into the street.<p>

The heavy door she pushes open he catches, shielding her as it bounces back, his free hand still wrapped possessively around her stomach.

He holds her firm against his body, feeling her shudder when she tips her head back and laughs.

It's all for show, to distract, to draw seeking eyes to them before they quickly lose interest in the mundane everyday activity of a dirty bar hook up.

She turns in his arm, her eyes rising until she finds his, the hand at her stomach slipping smoothly around her body until it is anchored firmly at the small of her back.

Moving like a python, she wraps her body around his, snaking her fingers through his hair and worming her bare leg between his thighs. He plays along, his mind still humming from the body shot. So it doesn't take much to reach for her ass with both hands and pull her firmly to him.

If they are putting on an act it's gonna be a damn fine one. Oscar winning in fact he thinks, before he tugs her closer again, one hand sliding into the back pocket of her denim shorts, firm over the cheek of her backside.

Castle feels her gasp, a growl of annoyance, maybe even arousal, and knows he will probably pay for it later. But he can't quite bring himself to care. Kate feels too good pressed against him in the doorway of the bar.

It takes him by surprise when her arm winds around his neck and she pulls his head down to her lips.

He doesn't know what he expects, its most certainly not what she says next "Do you know how to drive a Harley?" Kate hisses.

Castle is so taken aback by the question, he barks his response into her ear, sees her flinch before she narrows her eyes in annoyance "Do you know-"

"No I heard you. I just... no I have no idea...why?"

"Because my bike's here but Esposito drove it in and I don't think its gonna go down too well with," she cocked her head backwards so he lifted his eyes and took in the crowd behind him. "If you sit behind me as we ride off into the sunset."

Castle laughed, dryly, because that was exactly what his fantasy had been. This strong, beautiful, fiercely intelligent woman driving him off anywhere on the back of her Harley wouldn't make him feel less manly, if anything it would make him feel like a god.

Zeus himself shot towards the heavens by the one and only Katherine Beckett.

Kate slides her hands down, slowly along his body until she finds his fingers, linking them together with another fake laugh.

She can feel Castle's confusion, the fake chuckle he gives in response before tugging her close. When his hand slides into her hair and his lips settle over her ear Kate freezes.

"Is it going to be a problem?" He hums across the lobe, unable to resist the urge, he catches it between his teeth as he speaks, passes it off as an accident.

With his fingers still firm at the back of her scalp, holding her in place, Kate can do nothing but moan in agreement. The "Mmhmm." Leaving her lips the moment his mouth collides with her skin and she closes her eyes.

"Fake it til you make it?" Castle questions, pulling her body back into his and pressing her into the alcove of the door as yet another biker, giant and menacing in his leather jacket and burly black beard, nearly bangs them into the door on his way into the bar.

"I don't think faking is going to be an option here Castle." She whispers, her eyes holding his. Her voice is dark, the simmer left by the body shots re-igniting fast as their bodies mould around each. He can read the double meaning loud and clear, wanting to test one a lot _more_than the other.

Castle shuffles closer, shielding her as the door swings wide, pressing his knee between her legs as he holds her against the wall. He drops his hand from the back of her head when she gasps, ghosting his fingertips in a fiery trail down her side until his hand rests at her hip.

"Kate I would have absolutely no idea what I was doing." Castle's voice is gravel, rough and ready against her lips. Barely a breath between them as he speaks.

Sucking in the heated air, she can feel the pads of his thumbs through the thin denim. The slow rotation of those digits, catching and lifting the hem of her shirt, and though she should be focused on the job she's not.

All Kate can picture is the fingers that are now pressed against her flying across a keyboard, typing out the heated love scenes in his novels. Castle must have spent hours picturing his characters naked, writhing and wrapped in each other and now each heated swirl of his fingers elicits a tremble over her skin. Hot and wanton. She's so consumed by need, raw desire, that she missed his steady invasion.

When did he move so close?

"I don't believe that for a second." Kate mutters, reaching up and curling her fingers through his hair again. Running her tongue along the dry line of her mouth, she can't fight the way her eyes drop to his lips seductively flitting them back up to his eyes in a slow, steady perusal of his face.

Kate knows Castle is pressing his luck, pressing a lot more than luck at this point. But, she doesn't care. The fact she lets him because they are being watched, means nothing now. He is just too accomplished at catching her off guard, at acting the part.

It would be so easy, so in character to breach the divide and wrap herself around him. Devour his mouth and let him do absolutely all the things she can see coming to life in the unbreakable gaze that holds her trapped.

Kate leans forward, throwing caution to the wind, revelling in the oncoming storm, the lightning through her fingers as she pulls him closer. With each thunder crash of her heartbeat the reasons why she shouldn't just grab hold of him and kiss him fade further into the darkness.

Just as her mouth descends over his, Castle speaks, his attempt to drag her from the moment failing.

"Don't you have to call Gates?" He almost stutters, but Kate hears the hitch in his tone.

"Mmmm." She murmurs, her parted lips brushing his as she speaks "I do, but first, we need to get out of here." She growls the last words, a truth and an invitation all at once.

Castle's eyes, wide and focused solely on her, suddenly scrunch in confusion. "How exactly are we going to pull this off Kate?"

Kate smiles "Follow my lead Castle and do _exactly_ what I say." She pushes him away, hands gripping his shirt for a moment before she shoves him hard and spins around him.

Castle catches her hand as she moves, drawing her back, his own sly smile in greeting makes her laugh, breathy and far too tempting.

They move together out onto the street. Walking amongst the lines of bikes and the customers that linger, slipping into the crowd, blending in easier than she anticipated.

It's late and by now everyone is a little worse for wear, blurry around the edges. All they see are two lovers on their merry way.

Turning back into Castle's arms she raises herself up onto her tip toes and speaks quickly " Knock the bike off the kick stand and pull me into your lap."

If he's shocked Castle hides it well, and she has to give him kudos for the way he takes the keys from her hand with barely a flinch. His fingers sliding against the soft skin of her palm, teasing and slow as he removes the cold metal from her hot grasp.

He feels Kate resist, that smile again lighting up her eyes, as she drags along the long length of his finger. Her nails a sharp bite of reality as he gets lost in his imagination, picturing her hands closing over..

Clearing her throat and flashing her eyes quick and stepping into him, Kate forces Castle back, dropping the key fully into his palm.

Focusing away from her, taking a deep breath his eyes scan the line before him. Shiny black, neon blue, there is even a red dragon blazing across one bike. There must be at least forty of them stretching out along the road.

Castle realises this might be the first serious give away because he has no idea what Kate's bike looks like. He knows its a Harley softail, but there are at least five here.

Kate can see the apprehension flit across his face for a brief moment, as his eyes stray out over the throng of bikes quickly.

"Third from the end." Kate whispers as she raises herself up again, her mouth lingering over his "You got this Castle." She whispers, proving she believes it, believes in him, as her mouth moves almost touching his.

Lip to lip, a vocal kiss.

It's barely there, barely more than brush of her lips across his own, but it's enough. Spurred on by the feel of her mouth Castle holds her fast against him, preparing to devour her hungrily as she grips tight to his shirt. But there is a noise from behind them, the cackling laugh and gruff voices of men that pull their eyes from each other.

Kate shudders out of his arms, keeping tight hold of the material beneath her fingers and starts walking backwards. She tugs, trusting he will guide her, she smiles, and he catches on. Moving her gently down the row of bikes until her back nearly touches the handlebars of her softail.

He's mildly disappointed it's not the bike with the naked Nikki decal emblazoned on the side. Castle catches Kate's grin, seeing the moment she guesses what he had been hoping.

"How long have you known me Castle?" She laughs as he moves over the bike.

It shouldn't be as arousing as it is, watching him swing the thick and sturdy muscle of his thigh over the seat of her bike. But as she watches him Kate loses the laughter, pulling her lips between her teeth, staring.

She bites down painfully when, with one strong forward thrust of his hips, he knocks the Harley free of its kick stand, and onto its wheels. The momentum and the movement of his body have her humming from head to toe instantaneously.

He turns, using his body weight to balance the bike just between his legs, god he must have incredibly strong, toned...

"Kate?" He calls quietly, holding out his arms. Watching the frantic way her lip works back and forth between her teeth.

"Hmm, right." She replies sauntering towards him, each heeled step echoing, the sharp tap beating in time with the frantic rhythm of her heart. When she reaches him, Kate hums, letting him smooth his hand slowly around her stomach, pulling her in.

Turning her so that she stands with her back to him, Castle lifts her steadily. Allowing Kate a moment to swing her leg high and wide before bringing her down, hard, on the leather seat in front of him.

Once she is fitted between his legs, Castle gives in and squeezes Kate tightly. He allows his muscles to close like a cocoon around her, shielding her and holding her tight.

A blazing rush of air leaves his lungs, tickling a heated trail down her neck, making her shiver. Castle watches every ripple across her skin, relishing each one.

Kate waits until his hands move from her waist, back to the handlebars, before placing her own over them. She steadily laces her fingers through his, gripping hard when she feels Castles shift behind her, pressing against the line of her back.

Key already in the ignition Kate gives one swift flick of her wrist, Castles hand turning under hers, and the bike roars to life, sending heated vibrations straight through her body.

She is not prepared for the thrum of the engine, the shudder that cascades upwards from the heated metal to the centre of her body. She can feel it everywhere, Kate tries to rocks away from it, from the ache it creates, but Castle's legs hold her trapped.

There is nothing she can do as the bike continues to hum beneath her, so Kate gives in and tips backwards. Once she feels her head resting on Castle's shoulder, she sighs, wide eyes closing as her hair is swept aside roughly.

With her on his lap Castle gives up all pretence of waiting or watching and he presses his face into her shallow groove of her neck. Allowing his lips to settle over the steady, but frantic, pulse.

Overwhelmed, he suddenly becomes aware of Kate's scent, cherries and heat with a slight hint of citrus. The undeniable lingering tang of pheromones, invading his senses in a blazing rush. Castle barely takes in her words as she arches into him.

"Helmets Castle, we're not riding this thing without protection."


	7. Chapter Six

Due to unforeseen circumstances I will be continuing the rest of this story alone and I apologise for the delay in posting, it has been a ridiculously long time between chapters and I will try my damndest not to have that happen again. I would also like to thank Jenna for her help with the first five chapters.

I have found my love for this story again and I am so glad I did.

**Disclaimer**: I own nothing and no one.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Six.<strong>

_"There're other places that're better to go,_

_But I'm addicted to the red light show,_

_Feel like a King and she's my Ace in the Hole."_

* * *

><p>He's flying.<p>

The night chill of New York catches at his skin through the raised visor of the helmet. It drags wind smeared liquid from his eyes, it cuts harsh and abrasive across his cheeks and his fingers tense against her hips.

He would worry about bruising, about the marks he's going to leave just above her waist, except she told him to hold tight. And when he wrapped his fingers around her, marvelling at the way his hands spanned the entirety of her narrow hips, and she leant sideways, taking him and the bike with her, she had yelled back, cursed at him "Hold on TIGHT dammit."

So he did, the tips of his fingers digging into the same skin he had his mouth on not so long ago, and as his pulse increased in speed, thudding through his veins, so did the bike.

But it's so very freeing and he wants to yell out. His mouth is open and it would be so easy to just let loose and howl as they ride away from the danger of the bar, and into a night laced with something else entirely. Something intoxicating that seeps from the woman who appears to the rest of the world to be thoroughly in control.

Only...

Only every time his thighs clench he swears, would swear on every cent he has amassed, he can hear her gasp.

Because he's flying, and she's with him. She soars through the streets of the city, curling under his fingers, tight between his legs and so very responsive to every movement, every tingle of the throbbing engine.

It seems to catch her off guard and it shouldn't...

It can't after all it's _her_ bike, she knows the feel of it. She's a master of this molten machinery and yet she shudders against him.

He has intimate access to every ripple of muscle that drags and pulls at something feral within him. It wakes a beast that can do nothing but urge him forward.

Harsh and hard as rock at her back.

Castle could try to convince himself that her shivers are from the chill, the cold air whipping over her skin and the lack of clothes, but he knows it's not. He could pretend it might be from the thrum of the Harleys engine.

He could...but he knows it's not.

Because it started long before she threw her leg, long and tanned, tense at the calf and bare under his obvious, naked gaze, over the machine. It started before the walk through bar hooligans and before the deliciously deceitful grope in the doorway.

It didn't even start when his lips danced across her stomach and he sucked a barely there lime wedge from between her teeth.

It began in another time long ago, that internal shudder. From the very second they met and now...now they are flying.

Perhaps they have been skirting the clouds ever since.

Free and soaring over the concrete of the streets they call home, in wavering lines as she moves her bike through the traffic. She weaves and swerves, spotting gaps and lurching into them before he even has time to register the movement.

She's amazing, she's wondrous...

And she's revving the engine again, even as her body quakes through the vibrations of it, she can't seem to get enough, and they rocket forwards.

It's exactly as he imagined it. Maybe it's even better because in all of his wildest fantasies about being on her bike, never once did he imagine she would respond so freely to his touch.

He hoped, sure. But this?

She's flying through the city, Kate and the machine moving as one, leonine and fluid in every growl and curve as they take the corners just a little too fast.

* * *

><p>The motel is dark, letters blacked out and Castles eyes flit back and forth, almost bouncing on his heels, it's seedy, it's...it's the wrong side of fun and it's perfect.<p>

He couldn't have written it better.

The phone booth is smashed and there is an air of grunge and malice that hangs over everything. Yet Kate fits in so well, and he's not really sure how she does that. He watches her with avid interest trying to work it out.

She turns off the engine, dismounts casually and spins on her spiked heels to stare back at him as if she hasn't been a quivering mass held captive in his embrace.

"You coming Castle or does the night air appeal to you so very much?"

He nods, his lips moving to form words that don't come. To tease her for her reaction but he can't because as he moves to speak she removes the helmet and his mouth, already open, stays wide as he watches her.

She pulls it up, away from her face, puffing against the tendrils of sweat moistened hair that fall freely from their protective prison.

Her hair, beautiful and rolling unhindered in a loose curl from the black helmet. Cascading in waves of gorgeous chestnut, maroons browns and golds...it looks like silk. He remembers with crystal clarity that it feels like it too. Soft silken masses that trailed through his fingers, gathered and bunched within his palm.

He remembers it, will never forget a second of it and he watches her in fascination. She sighs, luxuriating in the night air that cools against her scalp, her fingers dancing through the hair until it's free and the curls from the bar are reduced to waves under her harsh dragging.

Her eyes slide shut with the pleasure of it, and he wants to offer to do it for her, run his hands through her hair, massage the nape of her neck as he lifts it away to blow against her heated skin... and hear her sigh like that all over again.

"Castle?" She tilts her head, waits for his response, her voice has lost that darkened edge, just a smidge, but the smile lingers behind her dilated pupils, and he nods.

He's coming, of course he is. She won't get rid of him easy now, where the hell else would he go?

They make their way across the darkened parking lot and he realises as they near room seven that she has no key. No bag and nowhere visible to stash anything, and his mouth falls open again. He doesn't even attempt to talk this time, he knows her too well, she will steal every syllable from his mouth before his brain is coherent enough to form them.

And the reason he knows this?

Her hand just slid over the edge of her top and dipped down inside her bra.

* * *

><p>Castle hovers just behind her and Kate can feel him, hear his heavy breath as her fingers slide over clammy skin searching for the hastily stashed door key.<p>

He's on edge and he can't focus, and she turns, her body angling to give her better access to reach for the key. Sliding her shirt low over the edge of her black lace bra she huffs and she shimmy's unable to stop herself, before she glances up and realises...she just sort of flashed Castle.

Her fingers close over the key and pulling it free of her ridiculously warm body she holds it up to him before giving a pitiful "Ahaa," of triumph.

It fails to lighten the mood though and she watches as he has to swallow thickly. Kate pulls her lips between her teeth and bites down hard watching his Adam's apple bob in appreciation and she has to fight back the image of her skin, soft, rippling and smooth, under his face, beneath his mouth.

His _tongue…_

But she can't let herself think about that, not when they are here, like some dirty one night stand in a cheap motel...and she still needs to call Gates.

She exhales, long and slow as she pushes against the door.

He follows wordlessly and she feels him watch every step, take in every detail of the room. She moves fast and before he is barely through the door she has already crossed the small room heading for the two seater couch.

"Cosy." He observes, and she catches his eye across the room as they smirk at each other. She points to the door and waits as he closes it behind them, sealing them inside with the deadbolt.

"It's dingy and gross but...I've stayed in worse," she says softly, shrugging and she watches as his eyes light up intrigued, more fodder for Nikki no doubt...or maybe just...learning all the things. "Stories for another time." She smiles again.

She leans over, moving her bag from behind the couch and fumbles through the pockets. Then her phone is in her hand and she flicks her eyes to him, letting him watch as she screws her face up in disgust. "I don't want to call Gates."

He chuckles, and she sort of wants to hug him and hit him at the same time. Maybe press him into the wall, re-ignite that spark, the feel of the engine between her legs...

"Well I'm not going to do it," he scoffs, raising his hands and crossing the small room, heading towards her and the couch.

"Coward." She grumbles. "All man in the bar, groping me and...lingering with the..." She stops suddenly when his step falters and his head snaps up.

Oh she's stupid, so very stupid because it was dissipating, or they were doing an amazing job of ignoring it because it was easier and now...now that hum is back.

She might have been thinking about it before, but now it's_ real_. She can taste it.

It feels like hot air exhaled across the surface of her skin, lifting the hair, raising goose bumps of longing, and electricity over her flesh.

He listens as she huffs, breathing past that flare of immediate desire before she swallows and pads across the thin carpet. She points to the TV. "The remote's on the table. I'm going to call Gates."

"Beckett?" His arm lifts as she scoots past him, sliding to one side to avoid body contact and she feels his fingers wrap around her forearm "About what happened at the bar, the body..." he swallows again "the body shot."

She shakes her head, "It's ok Castle you...you did what you had to do, you did it...well." His head jerks and their eyes meet and this time she swallows "I mean, very...convincing, you played your part _well_."

He nods "And I would do it again."

He would, every quiver of her skin was worth a little personal agony, he would do every single second of it again he thinks as he steps in closer. Kate drops her hand over his, her fingers soft as they move in gentle circles over his knuckles.

She lifts her head "And I would..."

Her phone screeches loudly in her hand and she glares down at it.

Gates name and number flash repeatedly.

"Okay," he says, stepping back from her, dropping her arm. He lets out a long slow breath before ruffling a hand through his hair. "How the hell does she do that?" He points to the phone stepping back again, needing a bit more distance between them as his fingertips tingle.

"I'm not telling her you're here so…" she trails off, moving towards the tiny bathroom for a little privacy.

"I won't make a sound." He zips his lips, and throws the imaginary key over his shoulder. He waits for a second before he breaks his vow of silence as realisation dawns "But?"

"Yeah." She nods quietly as she leans against the door to the small dark bathroom. Coming to the same conclusion Castle has reached, minds perfectly in sync.

"If she got Ryan to signal you to call her..." Castle starts.

"She already knows you're here." Kate finishes, and they stare at each other as an entirely different kind of tension seeps between them.

This phone call is not going to be pleasant.

She turns on her heel, releasing a harsh puff of a sigh as she goes, sweeping her hair away from her face as she moves.

Castle crosses the remainder of the small room and flops onto the lumpy couch, settling just as he hears the door click softly. He leans forward and reaches for the remote, the silence flooding the tiny room.

_Her _room.

He's in her motel room, hidden away on a covert undercover mission. A mission during which he got to ride a Harley and suck fake tequila out of Beckett's belly button.

He leans back into the cushions and smiles.

Screw Gates.


	8. Chapter Seven

**Disclaimer**: I own nothing and no one. BUT I have to offer immense love and appreciation to my kitty Kat AlwaysHappier for making my gorgeous image for this fic...I went mildly insane when I saw it.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Seven.<strong>

"I was lyin' when I told her

that I'm only gonna' lick her tonight!"

* * *

><p>Kate lets the frustrated growl leave her lips and her body thud heavily into the door of the motel bathroom. She tilts her head and thunks it backwards without thinking, her annoyance and tingling skin getting the better of her.<p>

She shakes, flexing her fingers, wafting her hair and trying to dispel the thick cloud of tension that has been coiling its way steadily around her all night.

Because...he does this thing with his tongue.

This little flick, curl and trace repetition of movement that had every single muscle in her abdomen quivering in appreciation.

It was hot...no, it is hot now, she's hot...

Warm, heated...

Dammit...because somehow the devious man had managed to tug the hem of her shorts low and skim the line of her underwear. All in pretence of catching that thin trickle of water he had accidentally spilled when he overfilled her belly button.

His tongue had chased down the offending liquid like it was a suspect, following the evidence of its escape as that small bead of moisture had tried to evade him.

He had rolled his lips, teasing her muscles for information, flicked his tongue questioning her skin and nursed the line of her hips with his mouth, holding her entire body captive under his interrogation.

Kate tries to shake it off, she really does.

But nothing works and before she knows it, she is throwing her head back again, feeling it collide with the cheap wood. The thumping sound echoes around not only her skull but the small bathroom too, the walls catching the noise and bouncing it back to her.

She freezes, waiting to see if Castle will call out from the other room, ask if she is ok. She doesn't want him to know she's in here berating herself for being so lost in memory.

And she really does not want him to find out she's fantasizing about letting him do it again...taking it _further_ , letting it_ last_ longer.

Kate listens intently for footsteps. She wouldn't put it past him to forgo merely checking on her by calling from the other room and just be standing on the other side of the door.

Maybe even using the noise as an excuse to shove it wide and stare at her, waiting for her to...

The phone in her hand cuts off and she glares down at it.

She had forgotten it was ringing.

And now the silence leaks in, filling the tiny space so suddenly and reminding her of the reality of the situation.

She's at work. On a case and in a motel room...but none the less. Work!

She drags a hand down, over her face, arching her neck, before her fingertips still over her lips. She traces the gentle sweep and curve of her pout as she remembers.

He kept touching her.

And she kept_ letting_ him.

Encouraged him in fact, she can't really deny it. The evidence lingers in her heated blood and the static line of tingling energy that is seared into the skin of her stomach.

Her fingers drum over the sensitive edge of her open mouth and her mind is dancing through the events that took place in the bar.

She should be calling Gates.

Every instinct she has is telling her that the longer she leaves it the more awkward and, frankly, annoying, the conversation is going to be.

But how can she conduct herself like a normal human being?

How can she make herself sound like a professional when less than an hour ago she was draped across a bar with her eyes clamped shut just wishing Castle would slip up and let his mouth drift a little bit lower.

Or his fingers at her hip deviate from their innocent path.

She scoffs then at her own imagination, because his hands, his_ large _, strong hands and beautiful teasing fingers were_ anything_ but innocent.

Too much and not enough sensation wrapped up in their charade and Kate sighs heavily, swallowing back that sudden surge of latent lust. Desire pricking the backs of her closed eyes and she ruffles her hair again, feeling the tacky remains of hair spray that clings to the strands.

Because it wasn't just the bar.

He had squeezed her between his thighs, claiming her hips and clamping her body firmly against his on her bike. They had both ignored the fact he had trailed his hot wet mouth openly against her neck, because that was just what they did.

But she had quaked and quivered into the feel of the engine and...this is getting ridiculous.

Kate growls, fist clenching at her side as she gathers the material of her top thickly between her seeking fingers. She holds it tight and tries to wait out the heated rush of adrenalin and arousal...she tries.

But it doesn't work and soon she finds herself twisting and tugging it, the black cotton shirt sliding up and over her head.

She wants to cool off and carelessly flings the clothing to one side, catching her own eyes in the mirror opposite.

She looks feverish, hot pink streaks across her cheeks, and a tender red path that skirts her chest and dips low between the valley of her breasts.

Her eyes are wide, pupils huge in the fluorescent light of the tiny bathroom and coupled with the smudge of mascara, the darkening of her lips...she looks far more dishevelled than she should considering she's not actually done anything...or anyone, mores the pity.

Her hand finds its way to her face. Fingertips drifting over the red skin of her cheeks, sliding against what should be the left over graze of stubble burn...but isn't.

They drop to the plump swell of lips that should be over bruised from firm caresses and eager kisses, should be...but aren't.

Until they slide over skin that has actually_ felt _ his touch, rippling and raised as it_ should_ be.

She lets her knuckles trace over her stomach, finding that 'should be invisible but really isn't' line that he made with his tongue.

His saliva must be laced with some mystical indelible ink because she can see it, almost taste it...but worst of all_ feel _ it. That narrow line where her body still hums, acutely aware of contact and it sparks to life vibrant and new the moment she finds it, like it's mistaken her own fingers for his.

It has.

Kate shudders pulls her hand away sharply checking herself in the mirror again as she waits for the awareness to melt away, the elastic stretching just a fraction too tightly and she hangs on tenterhooks waiting for it to slacken...or snap.

But she's Kate Beckett and she waits on nothing and no one, and her body does _not _ rule her mind, most especially in the middle of a case.

And she's growling again, fingers fisting in frustration through the tangled mass of waves that still surround her face. She yanks, tugging almost violently on the hair within her grasp, but it makes no difference, the feelings linger.

How many times is she going to let herself rehash it all?

Going over in intimate and finite detail what was nothing more than an undercover ploy...and it's not as if they haven't been there, done that and...dealt with the awkwardness afterwards by ignoring the crap out of the entire situation.

Shoving forwards harshly she finds a way to normalise, to calm her ragged pulse and to do her job like the professional she is. She fills the sink in front of her with cold water and plunges her hands in, sending shivers and goose bumps dancing up her arms.

It doesn't detract from the swirl of heat in the pit of her stomach, or that clench of aching need she's long since given up ignoring, but the chill of the water helps her regain her balance and concentration.

Kate takes a great cupped handful and brings it up to her face, slooshing away the grime of the bar. She rubs at the mascara and the sticky sweat across the back of her neck with the ice cold water.

It helps, but it's not enough.

Her eyes flit up and linger over the shower stall, chewing on her lip. She could make it quick, in and done in under five minutes, just to wash away the smoke and dirt that clings to her hair...the trace of his mouth.

Her phone remains silent on the countertop and for all she knows Gates has made the assumption that they are still weaving through the traffic of New York on her Harley.

She could risk it...if she's quick.

Her eyes dance towards the door, the lock still engaged and without another thought for Gates she's stripping the clothes away. Peeling them off in hopes of shucking that last trace of devious need with them.

Standing naked in the tiny bathroom, Kate finds the dials and turns them hard watching the water spurt out in jagged bursts until it finds its rhythm. She lets it run for a few seconds then turns the heat down low, the water coming through the spray icy and perfect for what she wants.

What she needs.

Stepping under the freezing water she moans, a high pitched sound of annoyance, shock and something entirely too tangible...

It feels like desire of a whole other kind.

She wants the hard press of his body holding her captive under the spray, warming her and teasing her in the rippling of icy droplets. Kate imagines him lifting her high against the tile, the way he had lifted her from the bar. The water falling in a steady river that mapped over the valley of their joined bodies...and she imagines following it with her eyes the entire way down.

She has always had a thing about water, showers, baths and liquid in general. Something about the fluidity speaks to her, she finds herself lost in the sensuality of the ebb and flow...the endless cascade.

The way it washes over her, loosening her from head to toe, as this spiralling sense of release builds from the soles of her feet all the way through to the tense muscles of her abdomen.

She moans loudly as the water, even this icy thudding spray, finds a place at the base of skull and hits it just right.

Kate loves the slip and the slide of her fingers over skin under the spray of water, the feel of the broken surface lapping against her like a million tiny, expertly skilled tongues

And now...

Now she has him mixed through with that fantasy.

The same way he is tangled in so very many aspects of her life, and as she deliberately keeps her hands high up in her hair, away from her too aware body, she makes a pledge with herself.

Richard Castle will _never ever _ learn he turned her on so much with just the slide of his tongue over her stomach that she had to take a cold shower.

Because she seriously almost gave in, opened the door and begged him to join her.

Kate rinses the bubbles off with one last twirl under the narrow spray and steps out into the room.

The chill of the air is heavenly across her arms as she wraps herself in a towel and checks her phone. She was only in there for four minutes, and best of all...

No missed calls.

Gates must be leaving the ball in her court.

Good.

Because now she can dry off and head out into the other room, face Castle and do her job.

Kate looks around and realises she's lucky she was lazy this morning, dropping the top and shorts she wore to bed last night on the floor in a crumpled heap.

She wants to hesitate, let that bubble of awareness float away, taking the feelings she harbours with it, leaving her in here alone, _frustrated_ but_ focused_ . Because if he sees it, that ever expanding bubble, he will tease at it until they make it _pop_ .

And he's just had his mouth all over her, his body pressing against her...

But she's not going there now...not after the cold shower and the mental pep talk.

"Shit..." She drags her hand through her hair and ruffs it hard with the damp towel. She's dancing in fucking circles again.

She steps into the shorts, balancing herself against the countertop, the space too small to accommodate proper movements. The soft material snaps lightly over her hips, reawakening the hum she swiftly ignores, before she shrugs on the tank top fast, grabbing her phone and unlocking the door.

"Bathroom's yours if you want it," she says as she keeps her eyes on the screen searching for Gates number, "I had..."

Her words die on the tip of her tongue as she steps through the doorway and looks up.

Because Castle is standing by the motel door holding it open and Gates, Ryan and a wide eyed Esposito have just stepped into the room.

The silence seeps around them, Castle's eyes darting back and forth between Kate and Gates, Kate and Ryan, Kate and the situation really, because he can see...

Well it doesn't look_ good _.

And he watches the moment it registers with Kate and as she opens her mouth to explain she is interrupted by the harsh bark of her Captain.

"What the_ hell_ do you think you're doing ignoring my calls in the middle of a case Detective?"


	9. Chapter Eight

**Disclaimer**: I own nothing and no one. BUT I have to offer more immense love and appreciation to Kat (AlwaysHappier) for making the gorgeous image for this fic.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Eight.<strong>

She glares back and forth between the members of her team, her partner and her seething Captain, suddenly immensely aware of the thin cotton of her tank top and the lack of underwear beneath it. For some reason she left the black lace bra bundled on the floor with the bar slut disguise.

The list of 'stupid fucking decisions I have made today' is just getting longer and longer Kate muses as she folds her arms across her chest, hoping in vain to hide the reaction of her body to the chill over her damp skin and the intense scrutiny she finds herself under.

She is trying valiantly to find that spark within that will allow her to fight back. Kate really wants to glare at Gates, contradict her and knock her on her ass with a whirlwind of information proving she's doing her job effectively, like she always does.

Because the way Gates spoke, the tone of her voice and that "I knew it, I always knew it" look she's bouncing between Kate and Castle, it was out and out insinuating Kate had lost control of the situation.

Kate needs to shake it off and pull herself together.

She needs that _Beckett _edge to stare down the boys, with their quirked eyebrows and dirty grins, to put them firmly back in their places.

But her body is still humming with awareness.

Kate can sense Castles eyes trained on her, and when she looks up, needing to check that the feel of his heated gaze isn't only in her imagination, she catches the dart of his dilated pupils. His line of sight swerving from the curve of her breasts up to her face, his eyes widening comically when he realises he has been caught...ogling.

He lingers over her face watching every palpitating flush of skin, smirking at her unapologetically, and damn him, it doesn't help one tiny fucking bit when his eyes darken like that.

* * *

><p>He doesn't know what to do with himself, he's not entirely sure where to put himself in the room. Because his very presence seems to be aggravating Gates.<p>

And Kate...

Castle tries to meet her eyes, but she's staring down at her phone, her eyes scrunched in confusion.

Kate was already on edge when she came out of the bathroom, and he's having a hard job keeping his eyes trained on her face. Because when she emerged she seemed to have forgotten a few essential items of clothing.

The fact that she's wet...

From the shower.

He shakes his head trying to clear it, because he really should be paying attention to whatever happens next. Gates is clearly a woman on a mission, angry at being ignored and tapping her foot, but it's Esposito that caught his eye when he opened the door.

The man is positively vibrating with anticipation or information; maybe it's just the thrill of the chase, taking down the bad guy...some shift or change in the case?

Castle isn't sure, but he's seen it a lot, watched it spark to life in Kate. That unknown tingle that emanates expectation, when she knows she's close to taking down the killer, so close in fact that the suspect lingers just at the edge of her finger tips.

So Castle understands that he needs to pay attention, listen to whatever information they are about to get bombarded with, work out where he fits in all of this and exactly how he can help.

But yeah, wet...from the shower.

And the night air is _cool_.

The combination is having a very tantalizing effect on Kate's skin. The slight shiver and raised goose flesh across her arms draws his attention, his eyes roaming over her body. The weight of her breasts tugging the neck of the tank down further than it would normally.

Castle bites down hard on his tongue, trying to resist even as his eyes drop lower than they should, and he knows that, knows he's in the wrong to be staring at her so openly in a room full of her colleagues, but he can't quite seem to turn away. Her nipples raise and press against the thin, nearly see through material.

His tongue slides free of the harsh bite of his teeth, running over the soft skin at the inside of his lip and he can taste her again. He watches the rise and fall of her chest mesmerised, lathing his tongue back and forth over the clinging essence of Kate that somehow still lies over his lips.

He holds onto the taste as long as he can, drawing it out, savouring it and watching her at the same time. His eyes trail the bare inch of naked skin at her hip, exposed where her shirt is folded awkwardly, before they move back up to her chest

Kate folds her arms.

Uh-o.

Castle swallows thickly, undoing the top button of his shirt as he steps back, lifting his eyes to meet Kate's, knowing full well she's going to be pissed.

She is, of course she is, but Castle is taken by surprise when he finds her, flushed face twitchy and a little uncomfortable, lip caught tight between her teeth. She looks devourable, wanton and...

His eyes start to drift, following a path he wants to skate with his tongue, past her cheek, down the long line of her neck and into that deep groove of her visible cleavage

* * *

><p>There is something in the way that he looks at her that gives Kate back her sense of self. He is obviously, for want of a better word, <em>smitten<em>. Sexy as hell and full of lust, sure, but smitten none the less. She can see it, she can deny it as much as she wants, but it's there.

Visible.

Kate can almost taste it and it makes her feel powerful.

Kate draws strength from the way his eyes are burning, large dark pools of naked desire, and she drops her arms from her chest, standing straight.

She levels a look at Ryan, testing the theory even as her confidence in herself comes roaring back. It takes less than five seconds of heated glare for Ryan's eyes to drop, his smile to falter and for him to look sheepishly away.

Maybe ten when she turns it on Espo.

And it's all because of Castle. The way he has her back without her even being aware she needed the support.

God how does he do that?

She doesn't get a chance to ponder long.

"BECKETT!" Gates barks, snapping Kate out of her musings "I am still waiting for an explanation."

Kate drops her eyes to her phone. She understands the principle of the thing, the danger of the situation but the woman is exaggerating, because Kate only had one missed call.

The one that had cut off before she had jumped into an ice cold, sexual tension relieving shower. But aside from that...

She lifted her head, damp tendrils of hair falling across her shoulders and leaving black streaks against her grey tank top. Her fingers fist hard around the phone and she forces her tone to remain...civil, if nothing else.

"I only...you only called once."

The minute it leaves her mouth Kate knows it's the wrong thing to say.

"Oh, I'm sorry Detective Beckett." Gates says loudly, gesturing with her arm "...How many missed calls would have it have taken to get you to deign to respond?" Kate watches the Captain's eyes flash wildly and gets the sense that this isn't going to end well. "Please...do tell? We are all anxious to hear."

Kate lets out a heated huff, her skin prickles with awareness and she lifts her face meeting Castles eyes across the room. He's watching her again, as if he ever stopped, and she can see his indignation for her burning behind his pupils. He's pissed off on her behalf.

It's hot.

Her breath is coming fast, ragged and almost painful as it tears itself free from her chest and Kate knows she is walking a very fine line. Trapped somewhere between slapping Gates and storming across the room to steal a frantic kiss.

Kate rocks onto the balls of her feet, not entirely sure of her next move, her hands fisting, white knuckled at her sides.

"BECKETT!" Gates barks again, "What the hell were you doing that was more important than answering your phone in the middle of a case?"

Kate opens her mouth, her eyes blinking rapidly. But she's trapped, what is she supposed to do?

Lie to her Captain in the middle of an undercover OP where every tiny nuisance of information is vital, could be the difference between life and death. Or confess to the entire room, her boss, her partners, not to mention the man himself, that she was so overtly affected by Castle, his longing looks and heated touch, that her only salvation had been the ice cold shower.

Was she supposed to confess that for him, because of his presence and the memory of his devious tongue, she had thrown her entire rule book out the window?

And she would gladly do it all again!

Kate opens her mouth with no idea of what to say.

* * *

><p>Castle watches the play of emotion, panic and confusion, anger, as it dances across the face of his partner. And he refuses to leave her floundering.<p>

"Ka... Beckett got wet." He states and everyone in the room pretends not to hear Ryan choke on a cough.

Kate narrows her eyes at Ryan and he coughs again, shaking his head in apology.

"I'm not used to riding a Harley." Castle continues, finding Kate and waiting until her eyes leave Ryan. He stares the story into her, hoping she gets it and lets him do this one thing to keep her out of trouble before the tiny rampaging Captain boots him out for good.

"We took a corner too quickly." Kate blurts out, catching on fast as ever.

"My fault." Castle agrees nodding "I think I leant wrong and Beckett got sprayed with water. So when we got back..."

"I had to take a shower." She finishes.

Gates glares back and forth between the two of them. Hand on one hip she gestures with a file that neither of them has noticed before. "Next time..." She growls in a voice that tells them even she can't believe she's having to let this drop. "Call me FIRST."

Castle rolls his eyes behind Gates back and Kate fights the smirk that wants to erupt free and taunting across her face. "Yes Sir."

"We need to sit down and discuss this." Gates waves the folder in front of their faces again, "And that." She points straight at Castle. "Your little...friend has caused me a lot of trouble."

"Maybe I should leave?" Castle suggests taking a step towards the door.

"NO!" The word is barked loudly from opposite sides of the room.

He's mildly taken aback by the force of Kate's refusal, but he's completely fucking astounded that Gates reiterates it.

"No." Gates states again. "You two drew a lot of attention in that bar." She turns, her hand fisting at her side before she tosses the case file onto the small coffee table and folds her arms across her chest, staring at Kate. "He's in this now. Your responsibility Detective. Understand?"

Kate mirrors Gates, folding her arms in response. Her nod is a barely there inclination of her head as her eyes narrow in contempt. Castle is already her responsibility, his life in her hands, hers in his. _Partners_. This isn't news to anyone in the room with a brain.

But there is something else, a ball yet to drop that Kate can sense and she doesn't like the feel of it hovering above her head.

Waiting to fall.

"Detective Esposito." Gates barks turning to the man as she speaks. She heads towards the couch and sitting down gingerly on the edge, waving her hand at Castle and Beckett "Perhaps you can fill those two in on what you got from their little...diversion ."

Diversion?

Kate's brow furrowed, catching Castles eye, he shrugs in confusion before she flicks her gaze back to Espo.

He smirks at her. "Body shot, remember?"

Kate drops her eyes to the floor, feeling her cheeks flame, and she can't hold Esposito's gaze any longer.

She swallows and looks up, straight into Castles eyes.

Oh yes...she remembers.


	10. Chapter Nine

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing and no one. If you're still reading :D thank you and I just felt it needed saying I actually really love Gates...even if it doesn't quite translate, she's just so very fun to make...mean ];)

* * *

><p><strong>CHAPTER NINE.<strong>

* * *

><p>Oh yes, she remembers the body shot.<p>

She's not likely to be forgetting it anytime in the near future, and judging by the look on Castles face neither is he. But Kate has had enough. Reminiscing or tugging at the past, whatever the hell you want to call it, enough!

"What of it Espo?" She asks folding her arms across her chest again and following the team as, en masse, they take the barely five steps across the small room, towards the seating area.

There is a couch, a small scruffy looking armchair and what just about passes for a dining table with a single wooden chair.

Grabbing the hardback chair Esposito spins it, dropping down hard and waving his arm as he waits for the rest of the team to join him. Kate watches him, a subtle shift in movement she has come to recognise over the years...oh, he knows something.

Kate holds back, watching Castle flop back down onto the couch he vacated not so long ago to answer the door. He scrunches down, wriggling to make himself comfortable, taking up most of the space.

Ryan, ever the gentleman, ushers the Captain ahead of him and into the armchair, before leaning on the edge of the table next to Espo and folding his arms.

Great!

That leaves Kate with no option. She either has to hover on the outer edge of the meeting or squeeze in next to Castle, because what they need right now is just a little bit more proximity to burst into flames and set the room on fire.

So squishing together on a couch...bring it on.

Kate growls low under her breath, catching the heated look that passes between Ryan and Esposito and she can't help but wonder if they somehow planned this. Her eyes shift, brow creased, eyes narrowed as she stalks across the room.

She most certainly wouldn't put it past them, little meddlers that they are, but the thought falls away when she looks up and finds she has drawn level with Castle.

* * *

><p>Castle can see the trepidation in her eyes, the blaze of green and brown that burns intensely now that the issue of touch is rising yet again. Their closeness, even when they aren't in <em>physical <em>contact, sparks to life that static hum so fast and he shifts as best he can to make room for her.

Almost immediately Castle realises it's going to be impossible. Because it's a small couch, and neither of them are exactly tiny, her long legs and his broad shoulders take up a lot of space.

Castle swallows, eyes still fused with Kate's and he pictures those long legs wrapped around his broad...

But she's sliding down next to him and Castle shakes it off as best he can.

He feels the cold press of her thigh through the denim, his leg firm against hers and he suddenly realises she basically stared down the entire room in little more than her underwear.

She looks gorgeous, beautiful with straggly wet hair and fresh faced from the shower, but she must be freezing.

Espo is talking to Gates across the table, slight hand gestures of annoyance from the woman indicate she's engrossed and Castle whispers "Beckett."

He waits a beat and he watches, knows she hears him, heard the rush of her name on his lips and chose to ignore it, folding her arms again and keeping her eyes away from him.

He waits a little longer then gives in and elbows her, not hard but forceful enough that when she lifts her head she looks pissed.

Kate turns towards him slowly, heated grace and feral anger she barely keeps at bay, so not warranted from his poking her, but her eyes open wide and she mouths 'WHAT?'

Trying not to interrupt the flow of conversation that fills the air around them Castle nods his head sideways and waits for a response.

Kate stares back, her eyes narrow further in confusion before her mouth falls open and again she asks silently 'WHAT?'

Castle sighs, puffing out his lips before he does it once more. A twist tilt and nod of his head and Kate wonders...just for a second, if he is suggesting they_ ditch_ the case and get out of here.

She's not saying no...But...NOW?

Head in the game Castle.

Kate watches as he repeats the movement with even more exaggeration, as if that will help, and she's still totally at a loss.

What the hell is he saying?

What does he want?

'I have NO idea' she mouths shrugging her shoulders.

And Castle huffs, gives up the charades and reaches behind him, over the arm of the couch and into her bag...Oh she forgot that was there.

He leans back into her, the length of his thigh suddenly tight and pressed and hard against her own, and his arm snakes around her, pulling Kate close into his chest.

Kate freezes when his fingers slide through the damp curling tendrils of her hair, lifting them away from her neck. One hand falls over her arm, sliding across her shoulder whilst the other moves her hair again, his thumb soothing across the back of her neck, scraping softly at the base of her skull.

It takes every ounce of self control Kate has ever had to hold in the moan, but she can still feel it rumble through her chest. The barest of hums passing her lips and she's absolutely rooted to the spot until she feels the softness of her sweat shirt drape around her.

Castle lets her hair fall onto her back once he has the shirt in place, but keeps his body draped around hers; holding up the shirt so she can slip her arms through the sleeves, drag up the zipper and smoosh into the familiar warmth.

His fingers linger across her shoulder before suddenly, as if realisation hits him, he clears his throat and backs off, sliding over to his side of the couch.

Kate catches his hand as he pulls away, amazed by the level of caring, the depth of emotion he can surrender himself to with such a simple offering in the most awkward of settings.

"Thank you," she murmurs, her thumb moving in a steady sweep over the back of his hand and she turns to face him, finds a much better angle for their bodies, aligning gently as she blinks up at him.

"Are you two _quite_ finished?" Gates asks from across the room, and their heads snap up with universal synchronicity to find the woman glaring at them.

"She was cold." Castle states, folding his arms in defiance, his attempt to stare the Captain down lasting a matter of seconds, his eyes darting away, first to Kate and then to the boys, taking in their individual smirks.

Castle is so engrossed in the mocking stares of the other men that he doesn't see Kate's eyes fall to Gates. He doesn't witness the flash of annoyance and anger when Kate comes to the realisation that, yeah, Gates is the Captain but _seriously_?

She really needs to get the fuck out!

* * *

><p>Esposito spreads the files out on the table, shuffling the surveillance photos around, and Castle reaches forwards to snag one but stops. He doesn't even know what the suspects looks like, who exactly it is this case revolves around.<p>

Kate moves, sliding her hand past his thigh and dragging two photos across the table towards him, subtle and smooth, as if she's looking herself.

One is a close up, waist up, of a man in his late 40's, early 50's who has clearly seen better days. He's chunky around the middle, beer gut and too tight shirt, dark hair, sunglasses and...Ugh, gross, Castle grimaces, a greasy black comb over.

The other is full length. A good looking, tall and tanned guy in his early 30's. He's standing on a street corner, casual in jeans and a white tee that shows off a good proportion of muscle, biceps and chest. Blonde hair in too perfect disarray as he tilts over his phone.

"So after the...incident." Esposito begins, looking up at Castle and Beckett with a barely hidden smirk.

"Be specific Detective Esposito." Gates barks.

"After the little...show that you guys put on," He clears his throat, looking at the flushed faces of his partners and suddenly it's not only funny and embarrassing it's a bit uncomfortable. "After the shoving and the alley, the body shot, Logan left and I tailed him." He finishes in a rush.

Kate slyly taps the picture of the blonde guy, letting Castle know that he's Logan. Making the greasy comb over man Vince DiSilva.

Castle moves, pressing his knee into Kate's in acknowledgement, and thanks, before he lifts his head and listens intently to Espo's version of the events that took place when he was draped over Kate's body on the bar.

"He made it maybe two blocks before he made a call." Espo continues. "I was close enough to hear him say DiSilvas name." His eyes flash to Becketts, "They were discussing times."

"Trying to arrange a meet." Kate smirks, her entire demeanour changing as she sparks to life with the thrill of the hunt, the chase, taking down the scum bag. Castles eyes are glued to her face, watching as her lips kink to one side and she nods for Esposito to continue.

"He started telling him about this bar he knows, how it's new." Espo nods back, "an interesting place where he saw a guy get tossed on his ass for making a pass at another guy's girl."

Ryan interrupts, "We're about ninety-nine percent certain that was you three." He waves his hand between Beckett, Espo and Castle.

Esposito grunts, annoyance or agreement it isn't clear before he carries on. "Logan says, it's a rough place, dirty, loud..."

"The kind of place they won't get overheard easily." Castle throws out.

"Exactly." Kate agrees, ignoring the roll of Gates eyes, far too engrossed to give a crap.

Esposito smiles, a quirk of his lips that has both Kate and Castle worried before he launches into this last juicy titbit of information. "Logan says it's the kind of place they do body shots."

Oh god!

"Well worth watching," He leans forward, arms braced over the back of the wooden chair as he stares down the squirming couple on the couch. "He went on and on about this one specific couple, how they seemed to forget they weren't at home alone in their bedroom."

Ryan interrupts again, a grin wide on his face, feeling safe as he stands behind the Captain, out of her line of sight. He points at Castle and Beckett "Again...that was you two."

"Yeah." Kate grumbles, "We got that, thanks."

Esposito's grin doesn't look like it's going anywhere anytime soon and he starts talking again. "Logan was very..._descriptive_ when it came to the part in the story where the guy laid the girl over the bar. Kept telling DiSilva how they put on a good show for the other customers, how _hot_ they were together."

Espo watches the way Castle and Beckett have moved subconsciously, angling their bodies away from each other, as if the mere mention of the touch will bring it to life again. "He kept focusing on this one specific detail, how the guy hoisted the girl's shirt up and ran his tongue along her..."

"Is there a point to all this reminiscing?" Castle growls, pulling his lips into a thin line, fighting back the memories Espo has set to dancing around his mind.

The Captain tilts her head, gaining the attention of the entire room with the simple movement. "Yes Mr. Castle there is...Mr. DiSilva wants a show, and the combined forces of the NYPDs Homicide, Vice and Narcotics departments would be most grateful for a distraction."

Kate scrunches her eyes together, her knuckles turning white when she squeezes her fingers tight. Oh please god no!

"And that's…where _we_...come in?" Castle mumbles, feeling it every bit as much as Kate is.

Gates eyes sparkle just a bit with an odd sort of pleasure as she nods, agreeing, "And that's where you come in."


	11. Chapter Ten

**Disclaimer:**I own nothing and no one.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Ten.<strong>

* * *

><p>"You cannot <em>seriously<em> be suggesting..." Kate's hand falls over her eyes and she sucks in a ragged breath before looking back at the happy dancing faces of her team...what the fuck has she stumbled into?

Gates waves her hand, shaking her head "Excuse me _Detective_ but A. I was not suggesting anything, and B. I was not the one who called for _shots_."

Crap, she's got her there, Kate thinks as her head snaps up and she swears if either Ryan or Espo smirk or so much as _breathe _funny she will stride across the room and knee them in the...

"I am merely pointing out Beckett," Gates says forcefully, dragging her attention back, "that you showed...initiative."

It's a backhanded compliment if ever there was one, and Kate swallows, remembering the way her shirt was up around her ribs. She showed a hell of a lot more than _initiative_, but yeah, ok, that works.

"And if the opportunity to distract our suspects arises again, I expect you to be professional, do your job, and take it."

* * *

><p>The words hang in the air between them. Castles eyes fixed firmly on Kate. Watching the slow nod of understanding she gives the Captain, the way her lip battles with her teeth, the long fingers of her right hand snaking through her hair.<p>

Oh, yeah he wants to _take_ a lot of things, but he's not entirely sure he can be _professional_ whilst doing...it.

His eyes linger over her fingers when she suddenly moves her hand and skims her knee, her nails just shy of touching his thigh and Castle knows without doubt professional with her went out the window about four years ago.

He could be loud, he thinks, watching the way her slender fingers drum as she listens to her boss, annoyance and frustration pounding through the tips and into her pink skin.

He could be demanding,_ attentive_, he ponders watching the pathetic fluorescent light bouncing off of her face, and she looks tired but beautifully awake and vibrant at the same time.

He could be rough, gentle, hard and fast and...Oh he could really really _slow down_ and take his time. Enjoy a long drawn out perusal of _her_ from head to toe.

He could be focused, yes definitely focused...on doing everything in his power to drag that noise from her again.

The one she made when he kissed her, her nails tugging through his hair, the last time they went undercover. Or that husky little growl and shudder he got out of her when they were pressed against each other on the bike.

He could probably get her to make a lot of noises, a scream...or whimper...he licks his lips at the thought, yeah whimper is good...

And she would force some sounds from him. Drag them out, tease them from him with every little trick she has mastered.

Castle lets his eyes track hotly down her bare legs, imagining them wrapped around his waist in the alley behind that damn bar...and he swallows again, needs some water...or some more whiskey, _actual_ tequila wouldn't go amiss.

Because they, _together_, wrapped around each other, could be a lot of things.

But _professional_...no way in hell.

* * *

><p>"<em>MR. CASTLE<em>?"

The sound of his name barked so forcefully makes his head snap up, hard and fast, his eyes opening wide when he realises everyone in the room is staring at him. He looks around quickly and he realises they are waiting for him to respond to something other than the blatant attraction to his partner that he's not quite successfully battling.

Esposito is sitting with his head cocked and his eyes narrowed in frustration and maybe amusement too, but he's Beckett's boy after all and both emotions play so well on their faces sometimes it's hard to tell.

Ryan's leaning, arms folded, with this look of utter knowing that takes him by surprise, because it's Ryan, and why do they always underestimate him? It's stupid really, the man's got hidden depths...strength and backbone and...oh crap.

Ryan gives him a nod, a flash of the eyes and Castle remembers his signals at the bar.

He turns to look at the Captain and Castle realises, it's the women in the room he isn't so happy about facing. Specifically this one, with her thin lips and eyes full of ice whenever she looks at him.

He wonders if he should speak, but as his mouth opens his eyes cut sideways to find Kate leaning forwards, her body twisted towards his and her hair falling in a curtain that stops the others seeing the smirk.

She thinks it's funny?

She's laughing at him now, when he saved her so gallantly...and alright fine it is kinda funny.

"Yes." He agrees, nodding with absolutely no idea what he's agreeing to, but that's fine because no one looks shocked or anxious, and he's pretty certain the only person who knows for a fact that he hasn't got a clue what was said is Kate. And she's still smiling at him.

Gates gives him an appraising look before she nods, "Good, I admit I was expecting more of an argument from you Mr. Castle."

Castle widens his eyes in a deliberate act of innocence, "Me? No, I ...fully on board with...the plan." His eyes cut to Kate again, "Yup, on...board."

Gates stands slowly, handing the empty folder to Esposito and indicating he should re-gather their information and tidy it away. With a scrunch of his lips in barely hidden annoyance he complies, rocking the chair forwards as he does.

Gates reaches, unbuttons her jacket and drops it onto the chair before turning back, "So, it's agreed Ryan will escort you home and..."

"Wait, what?" Castle jumps up, knocking Beckett sideways and catching his knee on the table.

Gates rolls her eyes, as if all her suspicions have just been confirmed, the man can't pay attention, his head too clouded with nonsensical gibberish and his inability to drag his eyes from her scraggly Detective. "I said you need to leave so I can debrief Detective Beckett."

"But..."

Ryan shakes his head, still safely hidden behind the Captain, Esposito raises his eyebrows and Beckett's mouth narrows into a thin line. The entire team in agreement.

_Keep your mouth shut._

But, it's him and he can't.

"De...brief...ahh," He looks at Kate, sees the hope in her eyes that he won't screw this up and Castle nods. "Yeah, yeah...good plan...ok."

Fuck, now he's backed himself into a corner, given himself no option but to leave them..._her_, and go back home. He shrugs his shoulders heavily into his coat, his eyes darting between Kate still seated and Ryan who stands at the now open door.

"So...I...umm." Castle raises his hand, "Until to..."

"Tomorrow." Gates finishes, startling both Castle and Beckett with her firm dismissal. "I want you..." She swings between them pointing, "Both, on the ball."

Castle nods again, giving in as he steps through the door and leaves with one last glance over his shoulder at Kate

* * *

><p>They walk the semi darkness of the lot in silence, Ryan just a little bit ahead as he unlocks the car, and Castle pauses letting his eyes roam over her bike.<p>

He's been sent home, but he smirks not caring, his memories of this bike and her body will keep him entertained for a_ long_ time to come.

He's just about to slide into Ryan's car when he hears his name yelled across the lot, Kate's voice, edged with something frantic, almost needful, and echoing in the spaces between them, reverberating in his chest. Castle meets the other man's eyes across the roof of the car and Ryan gives him a steady nod of his head and a knowing grin before he ducks inside.

Castle turns, shutting the door, lifting his head just as Kate comes to a stop in front of him. Letting out a puff of air, she laughs under her breath, no real humour behind it when she slows and he realises she must have been jogging across the lot to reach him before they left.

* * *

><p>She suddenly feels ridiculous; she just ditched a very irate looking Gates on pretence of arranging a meeting time with Castle, with her <em>phone<em> sitting on the table between them, before she ran him down and...yelled his name?

_Seriously_?

Kate opens her mouth, lips barely parting as she wets them, not entirely sure of what to say. But Castle beats her to it, his head bobbing.

"That was..." His eyes dance as he searches for a word appropriately vast and all encompassing that will properly describe the _insanity_ of the evening.

None exist and he lets out a pathetic "Heh..." instead.

Kate smirks back "Yeah..._something_."

Castle twists on the spot, his hands in his pockets "So...I'm in?"

Kate smiles, feeling more at ease with this slightly goofy version of her partner and she rolls her eyes, "Was there any doubt?"

"With_ you_," He shakes his head, "No...With Captain..." His eyes dart comically as he tries to think of something witty to call the woman currently storming around Kate's motel room.

"Gates?" Kate supplies, scrunching her lips, repressing the smile just a bit when she sees the genuine worry behind the humour he laces through the words.

And she wants him here, needs him to do this, especially if it's going to get as..._hands on_ as it did tonight.

As shocking as it was he probably arrived at the right moment, because otherwise she would have found herself spread eagled across the bar with a hovering Esposito and...

Kate barely suppresses the shudder, it was a _fluke_ Castle turning up, but the alternative...just...no.

"Yeah that's probably safest." Castle mutters, his eyes on her face, looking a bit too smug, a bit too much like he knows exactly what just went through Kate's head. But it fades suddenly, as he looks over her shoulder, back towards the motel, "With her, I wasn't so sure..."

It drops off like he needs that reassurance again and with everything they are going to have to do tomorrow; Kate needs that self assured, confident jackass within to be the one in charge. She needs the Castle that pressed his lips to her neck when he felt her reaction to the vibrations of the bike.

She needs the dark, feral, slightly dangerous and completely charismatic Castle that will snag her shirt, drag it high and_ lick_ her stomach.

Kate steps in close, her hand moving almost of its own accord to drag up the full length of his chest. "Nah, you're in Castle." Kate hums, hiding her surprise when her voice quakes with a seductive undertone, enticing him nearer all too easily.

She tilts her head, fists her hand in his lapel and murmurs, "Tomorrow...Don't wear a suit." Her knuckles are white when she lifts her eyes to his, "Go a little bad boy Castle..._leather_ _only_."

Kate hums, waits another beat and stares at him, watching the light spark and echo across his face, lighting him up from the inside.

"Makes you want me, huh?" He growls.

And _there_ he is.

Kate shoves him away, smiling as she turns on her heel.

"Can't work without me anymore?" He teases, tweaking the truth just enough, because sure she can, she can work without him _just_ fine, but does she want to?

Not anymore.

But she's given him enough of an ego boost and she flicks her hair, her eyes over her shoulder as she walks back towards the motel. The promise of _tomorrow _lingering heavily between them.

"Goodnight_ Rick_." She states, rolling the R and giving the K of his name an extra hard kick.


	12. Chapter Eleven

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing and no one.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Eleven.<strong>

* * *

><p>She falls into bed around 4am, hot and jumpy to the point she's actually contemplating going for a run, when her phone chimes next to her.<p>

Kate lets out a long heavy groan, the darkness doing nothing to soothe her racing mind. In fact it gives her imagination a freer reign than it should have given the events of the day.

She needs to stop thinking about him.

Needs to stop feeling his skin under her fingertips and his lips at her neck.

She needs to stop trailing her own hands across her skin, the trembling muscles of her stomach and thighs and just...

She _needs _him to touch her again.

She growls, throws her arms heavily to the mattress and stares up at the ceiling.

But her body is still too responsive, humming with a different kind of awareness, one that sets her on edge and has left her unable to relax. She rolls to the table to grab the phone, feeling it vibrate again the moment she touches it, thumbing the screen in confusion.

Lifting the phone to her face, the bright screen providing the only light in her room and she scrunches her eyes against the glare.

If it's Gates with another unnecessary instruction or underhanded reprimand she's throwing the phone at the wall and stamping the thing into small pieces, screw protocol.

But it's not Gates. Or Esposito, or Ryan...

It's him.

And Kate feels the sudden rush of blood to her face, the middle of the night blush creeping across her cheeks like she's been caught out thinking about his touch. His lips, his breath, his skin over hers...

As if he knows.

But he can't possibly and she clears her throat, sitting up and taking the phone with her.

_So how much leather is too much leather?_

Kate smiles, a gentle quirk of her lips even as her skin continues to burn and she rolls onto her stomach. Lifting up on her elbows she types a quick response, not thinking before she sends it, thinking is getting her nowhere after all.

The night seems to be operating best if she goes off of instinct.

_If you have to ask...it's too much!_

Within seconds his reply appears on her screen.

_So no cowboy boots? Black Stetson?  
><em>  
>Kate laughs again, muffling the sound with her arm as she shakes her head.<p>

_It's a biker bar Castle, we're not venturing into the Wild West._

Kate stares down at the screen, the man is...ridiculous. He was with her for hours tonight, he saw the people that drank there...he's a writer for gods sake, research...but he's...

The phone vibrates.

_Shirtless, black leather vest, jeans and the boots?  
><em>  
>She licks her lips, is he seriously asking her opinion on his clothes?<p>

They don't have that level of domesticity, just that undeniable flash of...something electrical.

But is he _seriously _asking?

Because now she's picturing him...shirtless.

The denim hits the floor damn quick too and then she's pretty much just picturing him in the leather vest and boots and...

Kate gulps, wonders if that was his plan all along and finds herself sitting up in bed. Her grip too tight on her phone. She suddenly feels ridiculously hot and she throws back the sheet and swings her legs over the edge, finding the floor.

Her phone vibrates again.

_Little help?_

If he's seriously asking, she _has_an answer.

_T-shirt, black leather jacket, jeans. Get some sleep Castle._

She waits for a moment, her heart pounding erratically with the knowledge they will be going back into it...together. Kate gets nothing back and she chews her lip, wondering if he is absent-mindedly doing the same.

Then she rolls her eyes.

At him.

At the situation.

But mainly at herself.

She tosses the phone onto the nightstand, gathers her hair away from her neck trying to cool down before she rolls to the cold side of the mattress.

Of course he's not.

If she knows him like she thinks she does, he's sitting at home, smirking smugly at the fact he just got her to pick out his outfit.

* * *

><p>In his loft, not that far away, as Kate throws herself backwards onto the mattress, rolls over and finally contemplates sleeping, Castle smirks at the screen of his phone before tossing it casually onto his desk.<p>

He makes a mental note of the clothes she picked out, wonders if there is a reason behind the choices and he comes up with a plan...

But that will have to wait until the morning, he glances at the clock, or more aptly the afternoon, because there is no way in hell he's tired now.

For the first time in seven days words are flowing fluidly through his mind, plot and scene and dialogue mingling and melding in an intoxicating mix.

And _muse_is the most appropriate word in the human language. Because that woman - Kate Beckett - with her hair and her eyes and that indefinable spark of life that makes her extraordinary...she brings something out in him.

He opens the laptop, clicks to a blank document and drinks in the white expanse greedily. His mind a sudden whirl of _fuck yes, body shots and motorcycles_and it takes a few seconds of laptop snow blindness before he calms down.

Then his fingers are a manic blur, the white disappearing rapidly, as he anticipates tonight.

Because tonight they are going undercover again.

Tonight he gets to be with Kate.

* * *

><p>It's a little after 12 when he wakes up, his brain empty in that wonderfully freeing way it often is after he's written through a block and he yawns. Castle stretches out across the large bed, his eyes closing slowly before realisation hits him hard and he throws himself upright.<p>

It's today.

And he's in the shower faster than normal after an intense writing session, the water scalding hot as he scrubs at his skin.

His mother's gone, his daughter too and he's alone in the loft for a good few hours.

Which is fine because Kate is loud in his head and the version he plays with in his mind, she looks _a lot _like the woman draped across the bar.

His blood is vibrating through his veins with anticipation, matching the steady beat and pulse of the shower whilst he thinks of the bike, and Kate and the thrill. The chase and danger, Esposito in macho man mode and Ryan's weird signals.

He stands further under the spray, replaying her words, _"Go a little bad boy Castle." _And just like that her voice is thrumming through his ears, caressing its way into his overactive imagination and his hands fall to the cold tile so he can hold himself upright.

The heat of the water does nothing to alleviate the awareness of his body, and now he's awake, truly awake, every little and not so little part of him starts reacting to the anticipation of seeing her again, touching her again...kissing her...

"Fuck."

His hand hits the dial, turns it harshly to the left and the water floods out in an ice cold cascading burst of freezing, tension relieving goodness across his too aware skin.

* * *

><p>When he emerges from the shower, he grabs a rough towel and drags it over his skin, hard and fast before wrapping it around his waist, hair dripping, and it takes him less than a second to make the decision.<p>

He needs to see her.

His body is too alive, too alert, the case and the bar and going undercover still too far away for him to be able to cope with his latent need of Beckett. He needs a distraction and if he can't have one _from _ her, he may as well torture himself by being _near_her.

He grins, drops the towel and heads for his stash of leather... she insisted after all.

* * *

><p>It's just before two when there is a knock at the door, Kate's hand falling to her hip, fingers over her gun. Because here at least she is allowed to be herself, her weapon stashed in her back pocket when she jumps from the couch, here she can shed the facade.<p>

She opens the door tentatively and is almost hit in the face...by the coffee cup that shoots rapidly through the narrow gap. Then he's bumping into the door, piled high with garment bags and jackets.

Kate rubs a hand across her face, swigging the coffee gratefully, not realising just how tired and in need she was until the burning hot liquid is coursing down her throat, into her veins and her blood stream and...damn him he's good.

She smiles but steps into his path, still tired, still on edge, but her fingers no longer over her gun. Her hands curl happily now around her treasure and she looks Castle up and down in confusion.

"Err...what the hell?" She asks, scrunching her eyes, her lips pursing in barely hidden amusement.

* * *

><p>"So I was thinking..."<p>

Castle tosses a jacket over her arm, and watches as she unconsciously inhales the rich smell of the leather as it wafts past her face. Catching his jacket deftly her hands tighten to the point her knuckles are stark white, her thumb skimming the supple black material...he quirks an eyebrow, taking in this gloriously suggestive new information.

She likes the feel of the leather under her fingers...good to know.

And he waits; watching the way her lip slides slowly into her mouth, leaves it at the same slow steady pace, glistening and pink when she drags her tongue across it.

Her hands scrunch, fingers sliding in almost lazy circles, whatever it is she thinks, feels as the material moves under her skin, it brings a heated rush of delicious red to her cheeks. And as her blood drives upwards, warming her face, his heads south and he shifts uncomfortably not wanting to disturb her.

He waits.

But Kate's still lost, still touching, and he clears his throat expecting her to jump or look guilty, but she lifts her eyes painfully slowly. The pupils are massive, their size obliterating the normal colour within and she stares at him with a midnight haze of longing. The desire pitch and fierce and she can't hide it, Castle realizes suddenly that she didn't even attempt it.

It takes his breath away.

And he is most definitely wearing _that_jacket tonight, but he came here with a plan of action. He needs to fully insert himself...

In the case.

And he needs to know things.

"You need a bad boy? Not a problem." He states loudly, forcefully moving so she is compelled to take a step back into the motel room.

Kate's eyes snap open wide as she comes back to herself, realizing with an agonised thud of her heart that he's here. Not just the darker version draped in leather that is wrapped around her imagination, but tangibly present, touchable...and her voice comes out a little shaky. "Castle..."

But he carries on.

He has to ignore the quake before he does something about it, and that would be wrong right? Because they are about to go undercover...so no dirty motel sex...

That's assuming she agrees and doesn't kick him out...kick _him_…

But there is something there that makes him wonder, that hot wanton way she keeps looking at him...

Oh, she's looking at him now.

He shuts his mouth quickly, opening it again when he finds the words. "I have a few choices," He clears his throat, determined to do this, lighten the mood a bit, "soo you can look through the bags or," he smiles, "I can model them for you?"

Castle barges her out of the way, stepping into the room and finding an extremely amused Ryan and Esposito sitting side by side on the couch case files spread across the table exactly as they had been last night.

The men look at each other, and then turn a very penetrating analytical gaze on Castle.

"I vote model." Ryan states dryly.

"Yeah, strut your stuff writer boy." Espo agrees.

And though Castle grimaces, as he turns he's pretty sure he catches Kate smirk out of the corner of his eye.


	13. Chapter Twelve

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing and no one.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Twelve.<strong>

* * *

><p>"You could have warned me." Castle hisses, his eyes narrowed as he moves past Kate to drop his bags on a nearby chair.<p>

Kate thrust the black leather at him. The soft supple jacket trailing through her fingers before it hit him in the chest. "I forgot they were here." She hissed back, her palm hard and flat over his heart as she steps around him.

"You _forgot_they were..." Castle raises his eyes incredulously, "How?"

As soon is the word was out of his mouth he knows it was a mistake. Kate's eyes, still dark, still wide, drop to the lid of her coffee as if the cup holds the secrets to the universe and the only way to find them out are to let her eyes burn a hole through the plastic.

Castle watches her flounder, both hands clinging desperately to the cup before she curls a strand of hair around her ear and looks up. Her mouth opens, whatever had her distracted so easily weighs heavily on the tip of her tongue and she drags it across her lips preparing to set it free.

"Hey guys?" Ryan calls, and Kate's mouth shuts tight, the guarded look back faster than you could snap your fingers and Castle sighs, glaring at the men.

"What are you two whispering about?" Esposito calls, raising himself up from the couch as if to get a better view, even though they are barely six feet away.

"We were discussing outfits," Kate states before she turns, her eyes flashing mischievously before she faces the boys, "I was just asking Castle if he had any tight leather pants hidden away in one of these bags."

"Eww." Ryan grumbles, his hand moving to shield his eyes, as if he expects Castle to un-pop his current pants and reveal all stripper-style. "I do not need images like that in my head..." Ryan bobs forward, eyes low, not willing to look up and he starts to mumble nonsensically under his breath, something that sounds like professionalism in the workplace.

"Yeah Beckett, not cool." Esposito agrees looking down at his notes.

Kate turns back to smirk at Castle, scrunching her nose and eyes twinkling before she speaks, "Oh I don't know," She says slowly her eyebrow raising as she looks him up and down. "I think he could pull them off."

And there is something about the way her eyes linger that tells Castle, if he can't...she will.

* * *

><p>"Ok I got it." Castle says confidently, nodding at the other three.<p>

"You sure?" Kate questions, leaning towards him so her elbows fall on her knees and her hands tilt in his direction, her fingers interlaced and clasping tightly to each other. Her entire body angles itself towards him, narrowing her field of focus as she waits, "Because you said that the last time and ..."

"Hey I was close." He replies indignantly, "And it's not my fault you guys have some seriously freaking weird signals, I mean giving someone the finger means, 'Call Gates'." He throws his hands wide, "There is a poetic logic to it but how the hell did you get her to sign off on..." Castle's mouth snaps closed, watching the manic dance of eyes and shrugs that ricochets from team member to team member until Kate drags the corner of her lip into her mouth trying not to smile. "You didn't tell her that's what it meant." Castle states with realization.

Kate shrugs, giving him that steady slow blink of disobedience she has developed since Gates became Captain and Castle has to swallow down a sudden surge of arousal, "Sneaky," He comments, his voice still thick with the barely concealed ache, "I like it."

"I thought you might." She says, another slow blink, another test to his paper thin ability to resist her.

Why is he doing that again?

"Ahem."

Castle lifts his eyes, and oh yeah Ryan and signals and...Ugh, "Do it again." He concedes. He knows it, he does, but she needs the reassurance and the way she's looking at him is playing havoc with his...

"Watch Ryan." She barks, and Castle realises he was still staring, his eyes pulling away from her shaking head and rolling eyes with a twinge of regret.

Esposito is watching him, his hand dipping to the bowl of peanuts, also a signalling device, and he chews steadily through his steely gazed analysis.

Ryan's right arm snakes behind his head, his left hand reaching to snag his elbow and he pulls at it like he's stretching, adding in a little shoulder twist for effect.

Then, Ryan drops his arm and the room falls silent save for the continued sounds of chewing.

Esposito swallows loudly, "What does it mean?"

Castle feels all eyes rest on him and he takes in the room feeling ridiculously put on the spot because really, he's got this, no doubt in his mind, but his eyes fall to Kate. She looks back at him, lifting a hand to her mouth as she waits. Anxious and hopeful as she wills him to get it right.

"Ok, it's weird." He's stalling now, and he knows she knows that. So he starts talking faster. "It's a strange signal for..."

"What. Does. It. Mean?" She bites out, letting Beckett have the reigns, soft voiced flirty Kate dropping away as she stares him down with ferocity and demand, her eyes glued to him until he gives in.

Castle sighs, takes one last look at Ryan and states confidently, "It means suspect sighted and carrying a weapon. But poses no_ immediate_ danger." He looks at Kate again for confirmation but her face is impassive.

She stays that way, blinking at him, the room quiet and ominous as the silence slowly convinces him he is wrong.

Then she breaks into a wide grin, "Good Castle." She nods, and he feels stupidly proud, pleased as she nods again, letting out the breath he hadn't realised she was holding, "very good."

* * *

><p>"We should have some signals too," Castle states gesturing between them.<p>

Esposito's head popping up from behind the file he has had his nose in for the last hour, eager for a distraction.

Kate twists to face him, dragging her eyes from the paper in front of her, "You know you'll be with me right?"

Castle shrugs, "It couldn't hurt, what if we get seperat..."

Kate reaches over to tug at his ear, "We could try one of these," she growls, giving him a hard yank, "means get your head in the game."

"It's not very subtle." Castle flinches, pouting but mainly because her hand is moving away, fingers no longer on his skin.

"Wasn't meant to be. When has subtle ever worked with you Castle?"

"Any excuse to touch me, huh Beckett." He grins watching the flash of red dart across her face.

What is with her? She's so...

Then she laughs, "Case and point." She grins widely and she may as well be chanting 'I win'. She smiles back at her paper saying softly under her breath, "You wish."

Oh and there is no denying that is there? He matches her tone, leans closer so the tips of their knees touch before he breathes out almost in a whisper. "Mmhmm. A lot."

And she jerks upright to stare at him, "Focus." She admonishes, this time her cheeks are pink and he wonders if she's telling him what to do, or reminding herself.

"Oh I am..." He waggles his eyebrows, but she's clearly not in the mood anymore.

"Castle." She warns.

"Fine." He slumps back in the chair, folding his arms across his chest.

Kate watches him for a second, shakes her head again and smirks. He's a fool, but then again, so is she. Or maybe it's catching? Castles rubbed off on her after all.

Kate leans forward, snags a peanut from the bowl on the table and tosses it at him.

She expects it to smack him in the head, relieving a little of her own internal battle with the rising tension. Instead he sits up slides forwards and opens his mouth.

He gives her a glimpse of his pink tongue and angles his head, catching the nut deftly between his lips, sucking it past his teeth and laving the trail of salt it leaves behind.

Trailing salt and heated moistened lips are not something she should be thinking about, but he chews and her eyes burn into his mouth as another sudden and intense wave of memory hits her.

Kate jumps to her feet, trying to shrug it off and startling the men in the room as she turns, eyes wide and unfocused, "You need to get out." She growls at Ryan and Esposito, ignoring the cough from behind her, the heaving and sudden intake of Castle's shocked breath.

Then she realises exactly how that sounds.

"We have to get ready." Kate clarifies, dropping her eyes to her watch as if that makes a difference.

Esposito rises to his feet, slowly, a barely there curve of lips telling her exactly what is running through his mind before he nods, "We'll leave you two...alone." He kicks Ryan in the leg, "Bro, they need privacy to..."

"Get into character." Ryan covers, surging to his feet, diverting his eyes.

Kate steps around the two men, slides past Castle and grabs her bag, her eyes never leaving Esposito's. He shrugs grins and breathes, "What?" Before walking towards the door.

She rolls her eyes, holding the door open and steadfastly ignoring the looks that are darting back and forth between the juvenile delinquents almost giggling in front of her. Ryan turns to make a clever quip and Kate shuts the door in his face, she's had enough, and she still has...

"Err..." Castle mutters and she spins on the spot to face him. "Want me to model now?"

He waits for her to smile or laugh or yell at him. Instead her mouth opens slowly, almost as if she's about to agree, then she turns on her heel and heads for the bathroom.

She stops at the door, her hand sliding slowly over the knob, "Get dressed Castle." She sighs, and it sounds almost like a reluctant plea.

Then she's moving again and Castle tosses another peanut high in the air and catches it...smirking as she closes the door.

* * *

><p>No cold showers, clean underwear, curled hair and makeup.<p>

Kate stares herself down in the mirror and runs her finger along the smoky smudge of her eye shadow, thickening the line. She's ready, ready as she'll ever be and she presses the back of her cold hand to the burning heat of her cheek.

His presence is only adding to the effect. Tonight she can see the tinge of availability, the sexual desire that is crackling all around her.

How?

What the hell is he doing to her?

* * *

><p>When she emerges from the bathroom Kate looks up and freezes in the doorway.<p>

Stunned mid step by the sight of Castle bare chested and pulling on a t-shirt.

It's dark blue or black, she's not sure, maybe it skirts the line somewhere in between.

But what the fuck does it matter?

It could be neon orange for all she cares. As long as it's in his hand and not sliding over his body, hiding his skin.

Then he flexes, arms curling over his head and Kate watches the line of his spine disappear, his muscle thick across his shoulders when he moves, grunts and gets the shirt to slide, clinging on its way down.

Broad and...

Kate makes a noise, some sort of squeak and he turns in surprise, fingers at his hips when he tugs the shirt into place and her eyes are still trained on the muscles of his chest.

She barely got a proper look at him before...But he moves and Kate looks up.

He falters when he sees her, transformation complete, his mouth falling open before he snaps it shut. "You look..."

She shrugs, attempting indifference and failing miserably. "Bar skanky?" She offers.

"Not even close." He takes a step towards her, crackling head to toe with the urge to touch her again. Curve his hands possessively at the back of her skull and drag her mouth to his.

The loose curls fall far too seductively around her face calling to his fingers like sirens. Another war of resistance he has to wage, another battle.

Castle squeezes his hands into tight fists at his sides, gliding the tense knuckles over aged and darkened denim, as he allows himself to fully take in her appearance.

He's observant, especially of her, and the first thing he notices is the black tank top. It's only a little bigger, slightly transparent across her abdomen and hanging lower on thinner straps than the one from the night before.

The strap slips and she drags it back into place in frustration before dropping her arm to her waist. The action makes him follow the flick of her fingers, the brush of her nails across her bare thighs, because she is wearing the skimpiest, shortest, denim shorts.

His eyes drop again, tumbling to the ground in a heavenly descent down her long lean legs until he comes to...ugh...those boots again. The dark flash of leather that wraps around her calves perfectly, tight over tighter muscle, the zipper catching in the light, calling to his teeth.

He wants to remove those boots with his mouth pressed against the supple leather, the zip biting at his lower lip. He wants...

She clears her throat, waits and then steps back so the movement distracts him enough to look up.

_Yeah right there with you_, she thinks as she pockets her 'undercover' cell phone and steps towards the door.

"You comin'?" She questions, and immediately the words are out there, floating between them, she regrets it because that look in his eyes, that thrill through her veins leave her with only one answer.

"Yes." He nods heavily, eyes dark and fused with hers before she forces herself to leave the motel room.

* * *

><p>Getting into the bar tonight is most definitely easier than it was the first time. The bouncer doesn't even raise an eyebrow when Castle meanders past him, and he wonders if this guy's undercover too.<p>

His eyes flit to Kate's, where she waits at the door, blazing through with questions that she reads instantaneously.

She shakes her head.

Not a cop.

So his access is granted because of...

Kate nods to the door, move your ass a barely hidden threat in the flash of her pupils, and he knows without a doubt fame will only get him so far, but walking into a room with Katherine Beckett will get him jumped to the head of any queue.

She stands almost luminescent in the doorway as he presses into her side, and just like the night before she reaches back, snakes her hand around his arm and wraps it around her waist.

She curls into him, looking up with a dangerous smile. She's looking for reaction, for fire, "Keep up kitten." She states gruffly, tugging him into the cloying atmosphere, the steady beat pounding from within.

He breathes past the smoke and the dirt and that sickly smell of human sweat trying to shuck on a new skin like she did.

Be someone else.

It's not as easy as she makes it look.

"Into the lions den." He mutters darkly, leaning into her, making himself heard over the loud music, the catcalls and brusque violent strains of Ace in the Hole.

But she can hear the edge to his voice, and his overconfidence could cause her trouble, be dangerous, but Castle _worried_...

She just doesn't like it. Hates it in fact.

Kate knows she needs to give him another boost, she wants her partner. Needs him more than she realised.

Turning until he finds his back is at the wall, she pushes him, slipping her fingers through the loops of his jeans as she curls herself around his body. "Rick," she beckons, her voice low, heavy with...something indefinable but thoroughly her...

His head snaps up, eyes level with hers as he falls backwards against the wall, and he watches the slow movement of her arm when she lifts it and drapes it around his neck.

"Don't worry, "Kate soothes him, her fingertips skimming his ear, tilting her head so he is suddenly engulfed in a cloud of her hair. The intoxicating smell overpowering the grunge and grime. "We took on a _tiger_," She loops his arm around her waist again, fighting the hitch in her breath when his thumb grows bold and catches in the back pocket of her skin tight shorts.

Kate raises herself, barely half an inch in her heeled boots, until her lips slide hotly over his ear, "Lions don't stand a chance." Her nose skims his cheek before she drops back, holding his gaze but not moving away.

And Castle swallows thickly, pretty certain neither does he.


	14. Chapter Thirteen

**Disclaimer**: I own nothing and no one.

So I went on holiday and was all set up to publish as I was away, I even roped in people to help accomplish this…then the second night I am there…I go for a drink in this bar and there was a band playing…Needless to say it was all very inspiring and I had to do some rewriting. Plus side, I think I got three chapters out of it :D sorry for the delay!

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Thirteen.<strong>

* * *

><p>Pushing off from the wall, her hand is harsh behind his head for barely a second before she's moving through the masses. Kate's fingers are still tight at his belt loop and she tugs fiercely, making him come with her.<p>

"It's hot in here." He states flatly, obviously, shrugging against the thick leather and her arm falls away.

Shit, so not what he meant.

"Drink?" He asks, as if that will help with the heat. A little fire through his veins probably the last thing he needs but Castle knows it will make him loosen up.

It's stupid really, not like they've never done this before, but there is some indefinable cloying sense of malice laced through with inevitability and it's not sitting right with him.

She slips off her dark denim jacket and thrusts it at him, head tilting and lips kinked to one side. "Sure." Kate smiles, her hand trailing his shoulder, fingers curling around his neck as she leans in close, "No shots." Her eyes flash to his before she pulls away, smile sliding from teasing into downright dirty.

Oh, two can most definitely play at this game, and Castle trails his fingers over the warm stretch of skin from her elbow to her wrist, his thumb dragging across the thudding pulse before drawing it slowly through her palm, fingertips brushing as he lets her hand fall to her side.

"Too much for you Kate?" He questions gruffly.

She lifts her lids slowly, and though they stand in shadows her eyes are darker than they should be, menacing almost. And her fingertips snag his retreating hand, "Maybe it wasn't enough ." She hums.

Then she's gone.

Castle feels every inch of his skin tingle at the loss of contact but Kate swivels, turns on the spot and beckons him with a crooked finger, over her shoulder, to follow her through the crowds.

To the ends of the earth...to hell and back...and with that sultry lilt and sway she may as well be calling him to her bed.

* * *

><p>"Got a visual?" He asks, elbows to the bar.<p>

He leans, but he refuses to sit, and every time he turns, his face just skims her shoulder. He's taken up the protective stance thinking he has easier ability to defend her, she's not stupid, but every time he turns...

The crackle of an almost touch is somehow so much worse now Kate knows how easily she could close the distance.

And for once, she does.

Gates orders and...

Licking her lips, dropping her palm to the bar, Kate shifts subtly, shakes her head at Castle and lifts her other hand over him to Mick. Holding up two fingers to get his attention before pointing to herself and Castle, the barman quirks an eyebrow, inclines his head.

But Kate just nods hers back, supposedly in time to the beat of the music.

For a second she's not sure if Mick's querying her call for actual alcohol or if he's shocked by the gesture that allowed him to register Castle's presence.

Either way he lets it drop.

When the man moves off to get their drinks, the gentle bobbing of her head should stop.

But it doesn't.

Something about the steady pounding rhythm is catching her a little lower down than it should, sparking deep within her. Kate tilts forwards, her hand falling to Castle's shoulder so she can coil her body over his, drop her lips to his ear and whisper, "I got nothing here Castle."

Whether she knows she does it or not Castle isn't sure, but the hand at his neck starts to move, thumb sliding until her entire palm is tapping in time to the drum beat.

He swivels, shifting from one arm to the other so he can stare up her, perched on the bar, her foot on the stool in front of her.

"I gotta get eyeballs on him." She states distractedly, hand still moving, foot tapping in time.

"Is he even here yet?" Castle hums, ducking further under her arm to watch her.

"Gotta be." Kate's head snaps back, eyeing Mick as he approaches with their drinks, "He's a regular, same time every night."

"How can he be a regular?" Castle grumbles, the place hasn't been open that long and he puffs out his annoyance, reaching for the glass, raising it to her in mock salute before tipping it to his lips and downing it in one.

The way his eyes flash open wide tell Kate he was clearly expecting water, same as the night before, and she smirks, one hand on his shoulder as she jumps off the bar.

Smacking him hard on the back when he draws in a ragged, alcohol burnt breath, she steps past him, "I'm gonna do a quick sweep," Her hand trails across his shoulder blades until she has his attention, "Make the rounds, get a little _noticed_."

Castle swallows, gulps really, past the fire of alcohol searing its way down his throat, the fire of Kate in his chest, as he watches her go.

* * *

><p>There is a shift in the atmosphere, the lights dimming or maybe it's just his narrowed field of focus, because the moment she sets foot on the dance floor everything else ceases to exist.<p>

The music kicks harder, a heavier beat that makes her smile, and though she was walking away from him, as if struck by inspiration, she turns on the spot, dips her hips low and wide, before flinging her hand high above her head.

Oh, fuck.

Castle's eyes widen, when she lifts her other arm to snake through her hair, dragging the curls slowly away from her face, her neck arching when she tips her head back.

Taking another step in his direction she swings her hips again, the hand in her hair falling, sliding past her neck, ignoring the strap of her top as it slips. Her hands fist in the material, lifting it away from her skin as if she's too hot...

She is...

* * *

><p>Kate lets her eyes roam the room, misty and quaking, her limbs tight and everything...everything dripping with a claustrophobic need for release.<p>

She wants to be loose and free, more relaxed and able to play her part to better effect, because she keeps telling him to get his head in the game, but her mind has been tangled in Castles sheets ever since he trailed his lips across her stomach.

She needs to focus.

But how is she supposed to do that when she is thrumming through, head to toe, with this awareness. A magnetic need that repeatedly pulls her towards him, tantalises and teases her to distraction before thrusting her away, aching and frustrated.

And she comes back every time.

She needs to get over it.

Or give in to it.

Kate knows she is powerless to resist, one hand in her hair as she hits the dance floor she drags her fingers low, growling her own annoyance at herself. Lost in the feelings of heat and longing.

The blatant lust she is still trying to deny.

Then that low down, almost dirty, _filthy _base kicks in and hits her just right.

A primal beat naked, open, seeking and curling it's way around her body like smoke. The hum of an electric guitar fills the air, collides with her heart and ricochets up and out in static spirals through veins.

Is her blood on fire? Kate wonders as she turns on the spot and finds his eyes across the room.

Is her hair standing on end and crackling with the electricity?

She doesn't care and it doesn't matter, her arm shoots high above her head and she sways to the beat, eyes locked with Castles and yes...Oh...this is what she _needs_ to get _loose_.

Lifting her hair away from her neck, dragging it up above her head, Kate tries to cool down. Too much heat, internal, _elemental_ , all radiating from the man who stares like she's the only other person in the room...the world.

Kate could close her eyes, shut it out and just dance.

But she can't escape, she won't.

She needs this.

And even if she wanted to, when she lifts her eyes again and finds Castle staring back, pupils huge and black with unmasked want, whatever fire had been sparking to life before boils over into a raging inferno.

Blazing through her.

It's all him.

All his fault, and she drops her hand from her head even as her hips dip and lift in time to the beat, and she points at him. Kate lets him know that she blames him wholeheartedly for the state she's in.

Lust, belief, anger, desire.

Every feeling and every sensual sway of her moving hips is because of him, for him she realises, but it's so much more than that.

The volume increases and they aren't even touching.

Kate can't help but wonder with this much between them now, parted, looking, what would happen if she just reached out her hand...

Kate lets her hair fall around her shoulders and she drops her hand from her neck unable to resist any longer.

Lifting, she thumps her fist down heavily on her thigh keeping time with the music, that weighty thud that laces through the meat of the song, squeezing her heart, echoing up and pounding through her skull.

Her hand collides with her thigh, over and over and over again.

Too much.

Never ever enough.

She finds herself transfixed, her feet moving on their own as she heads for him. The need to touch him, slide her fingers under his leather jacket, drag at the shirt until the buttons pop, ripped apart as she skims her hands over his skin, it's all too much.

She has to...

Is he as hot as she is? Kate wonders, taking another step, he can't be, he should be. She drops down low, tilting forwards as she bounces on her bent thighs, letting her hair sweep the dirty dingy floor, before raising herself up...slowly.

She wants him burning too.

Is his skin slick with sweat? Does he ache on the inside with this...need to touch her?

Taking another step towards him, pondering if he wants her as much as she wants him, Kate catches his curled fists and the way his eyes are darting.

Something's off.

She misses the beat of the music then.

Shit, subtle, she thinks, but continues to stride towards him. He looks worried, his eyes on her but over her shoulder too and she can't turn, can't be obvious, not good, and she misses the beat again.

Giving up all pretence Kate launches herself at him, bar slut in desperate need of her man and Detective in need of her partner, glad when he reacts and catches her in his arms. Kate slides a hand around his neck curling into him for whatever fraction of privacy they can steal, her lips hot to his ear as she asks "Problem?"


	15. Chapter Fourteen

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing and no one...but I couldn't let her dancing slip by _that _easily...

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Fourteen.<strong>

* * *

><p>Beckett...no, no <em>Kate<em> is dancing.

In a _bar_.

Untamed and wild as she moves around the twisted metal columns that stand scattered across the dance floor, supporting lights and plastered with posters of bands and bikes and semi naked women.

The eyes of the entire room are glued to her as she moves, angling her body in beautiful, deadly ways. The whites of the strobe lights above catch at her skin, bouncing back in glittering radiance from her body.

But it's her eyes...Smokey and enticing, the dark green and liquid brown swirling and Castle's mind is suddenly filled with visions of mint chocolate chip ice cream.

Is that what she tastes like? He wonders as he licks at his bottom lip. Seeking something he can't quite grasp.

She smells like cherries sometimes. Faint wisps of vanilla lingered in that undercover kiss and when he grazed her stomach and licked her lips yesterday she tasted like limes. So maybe if he grabs a tub of melted ice cream and lets the spoon slide across her chest, dripping...

Castle blinks hard. Pushing away the fantasy in favour of the reality, the real her so much..._more_.

Her cheeks are glowing, bright sparks of red in the darkness, glistening with sweat and she shimmers amongst the crowds of people.

Her fingers continue on their deadly descent, all the while she sways. Then her hand lands on her hip, slapping down hard in time with the pounding drums.

Whether she knows it or not a small space has started to clear around her. He doubts she cares either way, the lift of her lips too tinged with pleasure and rhythmic bliss as she rolls her hips again.

Smiling, bright and beautiful, lost in the moment, the music pulsing through every muscle of her glorious, gyrating body, the trance like look on her face leaves him wondering if she's oblivious to everyone around her.

The movement of her arm catches his attention, pulls his eyes away from the magnetising sway of her pelvis and Castle finds her eyes again. Bright pinpricks of lust and seduction zeroed in on him and the arm above her head drops suddenly.

And she points at him.

His stomach jolts, heart stopping dead in shock but before he can suck in a calming breath, ready himself for whatever devilishly creative plan she has just pulled out of thin air, she crooks her finger again, beckoning him towards her.

Whatever was left of the world in that moment explodes into smithereens, and she makes it blatantly obvious that there is only one thing she wants.

Though Castle sees nothing but his delicious dancing detective, he's not unaware as eyes all around the room flick in his direction. Some have the nerve to regard him with disgust, there's admiration from a few but some just stare in shock. It doesn't take a genius to guess what they are thinking.

Him?

Seriously?

And it's not as if the same thoughts don't run through his own mind on occasion, when she looks at him like that.

But what does he care?

She's a sultry goddess in tight black denim, dancing like her life depends on it, and she wants him.

The contempt and their curiosity fuels him, spurs him on.

But mainly it's the way she's just fisted half of her hair, dragged it above her head and smirked at him before turning on the spot that does it.

She drops her chin to her shoulder, holding his gaze the entire time, like a ballerina swivelling on a fixed axis, he's her point of contact.

Then she flexes her back, dips low to the ground and shows him the curve of her ass, and ballerina is replaced by stripper, spinning on a pole...

A...pole...

She bounces on her haunches, boots almost too tight across her legs, the sweep and swing of her hair brushing the floor before she stands erect again, and she flashes her eyes at him, getting frustrated.

But Castle can't bring himself to care; she's giving him enough inspiration to fill a hundred books...none of them publishable, bordering on porn but...damn...

Then she gives up all semblance of waiting and takes a step towards him.

It's like a thunder crash around the room, maybe just inside his head, when she takes that step towards claiming what she wants.

It doesn't matter that it's for show...

If it is.

He's not so sure anymore.

But either way, that first step is like a lightning strike straight through the centre of his body and Castle pushes away from the bar.

And as he moves, he listens to the lyrics, taking in the universes twisted messaging system as words dripping with dirt and barely concealed innuendo pound through his head.

Being wound up, needing release, going crazy, all feelings he identifies with far too well as he follows the steady fall of her heeled feet, never once missing the beat with her swaying hips.

It's perfect.

And he must be less than four steps away when movement behind her head catches his eye.

It takes a second longer than Castle would readily admit for him to recognise their suspect at the wall behind her. Leaning casually, a beer bottle in one hand and his elbow resting on the sound system, tapping the thin glass on the wall at his back.

He looks completely normal.

Until a drunken biker steps in front of him and blocks his view of...

Kate sweeps her hair away from her face, throwing her head back.

Tommy Logan, has the guy by the throat, pinned to the wall, faster than Castle can blink, but Logan's eyes focus immediately back to Kate as she sways again.

She must register the look of worry, confusion, even sudden fear that Castle reigns in just a second too late. Because she misses the next beat in her step, striding towards him quickly, but covering it well by launching herself at him.

Then she's in his arms, lithe and fluid, moving with feline grace so quick that Castle barely has time to react, to catch her, but he does. Kate drops a hand to his bicep as she swings herself around his body before falling into him. Chest to chest, one arm snaking its way around his neck to drag his head down.

"Problem?" She asks breathily, chest thumping into his, pounding through the both of them with each erratic beat and she pants into his cheek, waiting.

Hot sweet breath gusts across his skin, and at this precise moment in time the only problem he has is that she's not naked on top of him as it happens.

Her nails catch at the back of his neck, pinching the skin as if she knows exactly where his mind just took him, "Rick..._problem_?"

Her hands slip down under the collar of his jacket and Castle breathes her in, yanks her by the waist, one hand to the small of her back, fingertips skimming her ass and he holds her tight, whispering, "Got a visual."

Her skin crackles under his, body snapping through with visible tension, relief and excitement. Kate pulls back enough that she can catch Castle's eye, asking her questions in silence, and he nods, answering, "On your six."

She's subtle; of course she is, gripping tight to his wrists as she turns in his arms.

To the rest of the bar, the watching world, it must look like drawn out foreplay.

Maybe it is.

Maybe there is an element of that when she laces her fingers through his and drags his hands across her flat stomach, splaying them wide and making him grip her hips.

She presses back, ass to groin, back to chest, her head falling onto his shoulder like it did on the bike. And though she eyeballs the room, ever the professional, she keeps up the steady, hypnotic sway of her hips.

Unable to fight the beat of the music, the pulse of the woman in his arms, Castle inches his hand away from her waist. Smoothing it slowly across her abdomen and up her chest, sliding slowly over the swell of her breasts until he finds the soft skin above the neck of her tank top.

He presses hard, skims her jaw and thumbs her bottom lip accidentally. But it has the desired effect. Her body thuds back into his harshly again, the music taunting them both.

No one moves the way they do, he agrees with the gritty lyrics as the song nears its end, and he would laugh if it wasn't for the fact she feels like molten lava through his fingers...and his brain, with what little blood is left within it, is just about keeping him breathing when she presses her ass back again.

Kate's arm curls around his neck, tilting her head back as she pulls his forward, lips barely an inch apart.

There is no way he has the ability to laugh.

Her eyes, pitch black and the most open he has ever seen them call to him, invite him to dive in and drown in their murky depths, and she lets out a ragged breath.

The song crashes to an end in a blaze of electric guitar and thundering drum beats and before he has a chance to stop her, Kate drops her arms and pulls herself away from him.

She turns to face him but sudden pounding on the bar makes her jump, cat calls and wolf whistles echo, for barely a second before the next song hits and the noises are drowned out.

But it doesn't matter, Kate's eyes lift to Castle's and he reads the meaning behind that furnace blaze of her pupils.

They accomplished two missions with one damn near Beckett strip tease, sadly minus the strip, but still one of the hottest things he has ever seen in his life.

Castle drags his hand over his face, feeling kinda proud he managed to stay somewhat in control as they got eyes on the suspect. His knees didn't give way and somehow he resisted, is still resisting, the urge to press her against the wall and make her forget her own name.

Forget everything except him...god he wants her so badly, wants to hear his name burst from her lips as she breaks apart...

Pressing at his pupils for barely a second Castle drops his hands to his side, puffs out his frustration to no avail. She's everywhere, coiling around him, tight and restricting, squeezing and intense and it's ridiculous, in the middle of a case to be letting this tension fester between them.

They should just...

Kate slinks closer, still touching, still focused. And she's so good at it.

Though it's under orders, demanded in fact by the Captain herself, it doesn't matter.

There is an element of dark rebellion through her movements, rolling off her skin in wave after wave of sex fuelled pheromones. Seeping between them until it is almost too much...nowhere near enough.

And if Gates wants a distraction, Kate damn well gives her one.

Just like the previous night, they find themselves the centre of attention, and though Kate makes to move away, Castle lunges for her, stealing a breath from her lungs as she gasps in shock. One hand at the small of her back the other sliding through her hair so he can pull her ear to his mouth and whisper, "Logan's headed this way."


	16. Chapter Fifteen

**Disclaimer**: I own nothing and no one.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Fifteen.<strong>

* * *

><p>Castle feels her fingers tense against his forearm. Her eyes staring into his, blinking rapidly. But not seeing him. She's lost in her own head as she formulates a plan.<p>

Then her pupils snap into focus, her hands squeeze him almost painfully and Kate throws her head back, barking out a loud "HA!" as if he is the funniest man in the universe.

He is, in his own mind more often than not, but an encroaching suspect, vicious too judging by the way he pinned that biker, heading for them was not really all _that _funny.

Castle tries not to scrunch his eyes in confusion, letting the arm draped around her waist hang loosely, his shoulders dropping.

Normal, he has to look normal.

Then her fingers are sliding through his hair and it's all about staying upright.

Cheek to cheek suddenly, Kate mumbles, "Close?" And though he is in more ways than one, the added element of danger is putting a dampener on his libido.

Not much of one, if the snarl through his chest and the intense contact of her thigh against his is anything to go by. But enough that he can hold on.

Gripping tight he turns Kate in his arms, angling his head so his nose runs along the length of hers, he's close enough to feel the heat pounding through her bottom lip when it brushes his, and to anyone observing...and there is definitely a lot of _watching_ going on, they look just like any other couple in the middle of a kiss.

Except they aren't.

"Less than three feet." Castle breathes, the heat of his breath and weight of the words heavy as they circle her ear.

Castle hears the moan of acknowledgement, the moan that signifies the end of a fake, almost kiss, then Kate leans back.

Her eyes are dark when she looks up, so dark in the last two days, that for a fleeting second Castle wonders if he will ever see the flash of green sparkle through them again.

There is something dangerous about this shadowed woman before him, the way she snaps the persona on and off yet remains elementally connected to the thrum that lingers between them.

Light or shadowed, pitch black or hazel green, she is _extraordinary_.

* * *

><p>Less than three feet.<p>

She has less than three feet to get moving, put her plan into action. Get Logan away from the door so Espo and the guys from Vice have a chance to intercept DiSilva.

Logan could be heading to the men's room.

He could be trailing some bar skank and making a detour to the side exit and alleyway.

Maybe he's onto them and he needs to make a quick getaway.

It doesn't matter.

Kate has to stall him. She needs to be able to hear anything but the thud of her own pulse, and the heaving panting..._leading_ breath of her partner as it penetrates her ear.

She has to concentrate.

This is exactly what Gates has been warning her about, the wicked spark between them, intoxicating and deadly...and no fucking way is she about to let that woman be proven right.

But Castle's lip...it's within sucking distance from her mouth.

And it's just so...tempting in that evil naughty way he brings out in her, to think that all she has to do is..._lick_ her own lips and her tongue will slide across his mouth.

She swallows, cheek sliding back and forth across the stubble...sexy.

Kate shoves him back but doesn't let go, not sure if she ever can now, her hands feel glued to the leather, glued to him.

And she needs just a small gap between them. Breathing room to uncloud her head.

But her body is clearly in charge, because she lifts her leg, hips sliding, thigh curving around his thick chunk of muscle. And before she knows exactly what she's doing, her entire right leg is wrapped around him so they are pelvis to pelvis, clinging tight and swaying infinitesimally.

He growls...or she does. Or the beast between them, brought to life in fires of unquenched desire, unresolved sexual excitement, unresolved _everything,_ roars to life.

But the sound is jagged, feral and no where near as dangerous as when she lifts her eyes, voice quaking and she whispers, "Pool table."

* * *

><p>Before she has a chance to utter another word, Castle lifts her other leg from the floor. His fingers dig into the tense juicy flesh of her thigh, thumb sliding under the denim rim, before he pulls it hard.<p>

Kate already has her arm coiled around his neck, forced to go with the dragging movement and he feels her kick off from the ground.

Her entire body weight thuds into his groin, and she rocks just enough that... oh god...then she freezes, ankles hooking at the backs of his legs. Castle sucks in a much needed breath. A breath that doesn't do anything at all except press her more firmly against him when his chest rises, and, sliding his hands under her ass, he walks her across the room.

Desperately clinging to him, her head drops to his shoulder, tilting to one side so her hair falls in a tumbling mass across his arm. When he looks down into her eyes, skirting a table on his treacherous path, the look of shock, awe and unadulterated lust take him by surprise.

She likes it.

Castle watches it thrill through her in flickering waves. It shocks her too. He can see the fight as it happens, a steady internal battle between self desire and professionalism.

He's seen it before, tasted it just that once. But he's never seen her so close to losing control of it in the way she is now.

His thumbs dance across her skin, and seriously is she made of silk? He won't be able to slide into bed without images of her thighs under his fingertips and...

He spots an empty table, the fates playing into his hands tonight, much like Kate is as she shifts again, and thuds back down.

What the hell is she trying to…?

Oh.

Her eyes are over his shoulder, watching, waiting, analysing.

They reach the pool table, and with more reluctance than Castle ever imagined possible, he drops her down onto the wooden rim, his hands falling to the soft green surface behind. His head dropping into the curve of her shoulder as he struggles to get control of his rampaging heartbeat.

Kate keeps her feet hooked around him, heels tangled at his back holding him in place, listening to his breath calm considerably in her ear.

His entire body is cocooned around hers and her eyes slide shut, cheek skimming the top of his head. His hair tickles, barely there, across her face and when he forces himself to stand upright, she can't unclench her fingers from his t-shirt.

Her head drops to his chest and she pants into him in desperation. Sensory overload, something, because, the place is alive with this raw buzz that makes everything feel frantic, or maybe that's just her.

The anticipation of the evening finally getting the better of her. Kate closes her eyes against his solid form, shocking herself with the level of trust she places in this man, in the middle of her undercover op.

She has just surrendered herself to him in every way she can right now, knowing, without a shadow of a doubt he would do everything in his power to keep her safe.

Then the warmth of his palm ghosts her cheek, and his hand runs over her hair and down her back to settle on her thigh. Letting all the breath in her lungs out in one long heated sigh, Kate wonders if she was wrong.

Her heart thuds.

Maybe he's trying to kill her.

* * *

><p>"Weren't you two here last night?"<p>

The words should catch them both off guard, but they don't. It's what they came here for after all.

"You look familiar."

Kate lifts her eyes to Castle's, confident, in character, luscious and alluring, before she peers around his shoulder at the son of a bitch Tommy Logan, and shrugs.

"Might have been." Her knee slides between Castle's legs as she moves, ignoring the man behind him deliberately. She pushes Castle back so she can hop off of the pool table, sliding against his body with a hum of appreciation, catching her lip between her teeth as she smiles.

"Wanna play?" She asks, a million answers to her own question blazing at him, and she smiles, her hand still at his shoulder squeezing for a response. With a slow steady wink only he can see, Kate hopes he understands, trusts that he gets it enough to...

Castle smiles back, turning away from her, no longer her shield in front of Logan. He leans back, sits at the edge of table and flings his arms casually around her shoulder.

The shoulder thing is all Castle, Kate thinks, tipping into his side, because she didn't...she didn't signal for _that_...for more touching, just...

But his rumbling voice distracts her.

Vibrating with control and so very deep as it rasps barely an inch from ear, hungry and thick making Kate fight to stop her eyes closing at the sound.

"She asked you a question." Castle growls, hand hanging supposedly limply across her chest. But Kate can feel the strain and the tension of his coiled muscles.

Logan shrugs his agreement.

And Castle's a genius.

She never plans to tell him that, but he interpreted her signals perfectly, picking up on every miniscule flick of her eye.

He reads her reactions, he anticipates her movements.

The same way he does when he finishes her sentences.

Back and forth, two and fro in perfectly timed sync until they reach the inevitable idea explosion. Knowledge and detail erupting out, spilling around them in glorious technicolour until they are both...

Kate scrunches her eyes and decides to drop that analogy for the sake of her sanity.

But it's the same way he read her on the dance floor a few minutes ago. He knew when to thrust, when to withdraw, when to pull her hard against him and...

Nope, that's no good either, because they are all leading her to think it will be the same when they fall into bed...

If...

IF...?

She jerks at her own imagination, flinches in his arms and turns it into a laugh.

Castle notices, but covers it with a well timed shrug and as Logan nods his head and Castle slides away to watch, his hand retreating slowly, obviously, and Kate starts to wonder if maybe she really does have the perfect partner.


	17. Chapter Sixteen

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing and no one

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Sixteen.<strong>

* * *

><p>"Drink?" Castle asks, waiting until she looks up at him before flicking his eyes to the bar, to Ryan as he casually waits. His foot rests on the stool next to him so he can angle his body towards them and watch without suspicion.<p>

Not that it really matters; all eyes are already on them. They have been for a while.

But Kate catches the look, follows, and nods. "Sure," She smiles, winking wickedly across the table. She reaches for the pool cue nearest, loops her hand around it and runs her curled fingers slowly along the shaft, "Something..."

"Sweet," Castle states confidently, stepping into her, blocking Logan from seeing as he mouths '_Okay?_'

Her eyes flash with sudden awareness, he doesn't want to leave her side, leave her without immediate back up, but one of them needs to be with Ryan. He's doing the sensible thing and that thought alone is enough...But...the leather as well and...

"With a..._cherry _." She almost leers around the word, laving her lips with her tongue in anticipation. Looking up directly into his eyes, Kate reaches out her hand and scrunches the material of his shirt between her fingers. Tight and demanding she uses the grip to yank him towards her, stopping only when they are nose to nose. "Don't forget the _ice_, _Rick_."

Letting his name roll its way steadily across her wet pink tongue, before she flicks it out into the atmosphere, giving him a reason to stay and permission to leave all in five little words.

"Never." He breathes, before her hand falls, and with a myriad of communication in that retreating gaze, Castle heads for the bar.

* * *

><p>Logan leans across the pool table, slides the cue deftly through his fingers, and Kate watches the ball ricochet into three sides of the table before just skimming a pocket, and bouncing away.<p>

She smirks, pouting when he turns, "Too bad."

Leaning in, she lets the cue drop, landing with a barely audible thud in the centre of the table. Grasping the thicker end of the stick Kate slides back, resting her palm flat on the green surface.

She bends, slides her body over the table and closes her eyes. The feel of felt beneath her hands, rough over her palms, centres her and Kate pulls the cue slowly through her waiting fingers.

Pushing it back between her thumb and forefinger, letting the smooth wood slide over her skin. She flicks her eyes up, once to Logan, making sure she holds his full attention...she does. And once to the bar, to Castle and Ryan, not talking, not signalling...but something.

"You like to tease him." Logan states, watching when her left knee bends, her right flexes and her back arches. "Maybe you just like to tease?"

Kate ignores him, sliding her left thumb up, adjusting the angle on the ball, before she lets the wood glide between her fingers again, smooth in motion across her hip.

"You know you look really familiar," He says again, staring at her with rapidly narrowing eyes.

And Kate gets it. Oh, he doesn't want to lose to a woman.

Fuck that.

She lets the cue fly, the white bursting away to kiss the red ball, leaving it with a perfectly angled spin. The red rotates, bounces off of another ball and slides into the pocket with a satisfying thud.

Kate laughs, looking up at the man on the opposite side of the table, "People don't tend to forget me." She states with confidence, still bent over the table, pretending to ignore the way his eyes stray and slide over her ass.

"I bet." Logan responds, dragging a hand through his blonde hair and watching Kate as she straightens. They trade places as they move around the table, but he doesn't try and brush past her, grope her accidentally on purpose.

Lucky for him, because Castle's touch is still lingering over her skin, and anyone else right now...well it might give her away if she breaks his fingers.

Taking a step back to watch him watch her, supposedly seeking the perfect angle, Kate lifts her head in time to see Castle step away from the bar.

Logan eyes her suspiciously, "See, I've been here a few nights running." He states darkly, setting down the cue and leaning both hands on the table. "I like to get a feel for a place before I..." He smiles at her eerily, "make myself at home."

Kate lines up her shot, watching Castle head towards them.

"I noticed you the first night," He leans as Kate does, "Hard not to, when I see a hot piece of ass..." He deliberately licks his lips, eyeing her from chest to legs and lingering on his way down, making her skin crawl the entire time. "...Like yourself. Leaving here every night with completely different men."

She hides it well, squeezing her frustration and disgust into the thin stick, hoping it doesn't snap and give her away when Logan leans forward and hums breathily across the table. "Think it's time for another trade in."

Castle slams the drink down loudly on the edge of the table, "No, it's not." He growls, his eyes dark, menacing and...Kate smiles.

"He hates it when I flirt." Kate shrugs, not offering an apology as she walks around the table. "But, he gets downright deadly when people flirt with me."

She curls her body around the cue, leans over and plucks the drink from between the two men. Kate lifts the glass to her mouth, waiting for Castle to look up and the second he does she catches at the cherry stem with her teeth and pulls it out of the drink.

Castle still looks far too on edge, far too likely to release his inner Chuck Norris for Kate's liking and she needs his attention back. Dropping the glass to the table, she leans until her back hits the wood and her thigh brushes his.

At the touch he turns and Kate pulls the cherry from her mouth, the wet berry glistening bright and red as it catches the light. "He likes to step in." She says darkly her eyes wide staring at him as she lifts herself, licks the cherry once more, before leaning forwards and sliding it into his mouth.

He doesn't resist, but following some newly awakened instinct Kate pushes the cherry past his lips until the tip of her finger meets the warmth of his tongue. He swipes at her retreating digit, barely missing with his teeth when he bites down on the cherry and her finger skims his lip.

"Claim me." She states hotly, suddenly desperate to put the lecherous creep watching their every interaction firmly in his place.

* * *

><p>Castle realises she's asking.<p>

Her hand still at his face, her fucking fingers traced with his saliva and now she's pleading, and unknowingly playing right into Ryan and Esposito's hands.

He needs to get Logan away from the bar, and the door, keep him distracted.

She's demanding and in need of her partner, because this guy is still staring at her ass as though Castle isn't standing right there.

As if he wants to stake a claim himself.

And no fucking way is that happening.

Kate's on edge, and he doesn't like it.

Something twists in his chest, drags low down in his groin and sets fire to his veins. The sweet bite of cherry flooding his mouth and her thumb making its second swipe catching a burst of juice at the edge of his lips.

She pulls her hand away slowly, holding his eyes. Kate pops her mouth open, hand lifting, thumb tipping towards her lips to suck away the traces of Castle and cherry. But at the last second he grabs her wrist, fingers tight and hot as he pulls her hand back to his mouth.

Lacing their fingers together, palm to palm, Castle mimics her action, letting his mouth fall open slowly before he sucks her thumb past his lips, biting down on the first joint to hold her in place.

His nose skims her knuckles, breathing her in as he tastes her. Sweet from the cherry, salt from her skin and maybe traces of chalk from the cue. It doesn't matter she tastes divine and he sucks harder on her...

The man next to them chuckles, shaking his head as he steps back, "Do you two swing?" He queries, forcing their eyes from each other. "Or...just enjoy putting on a show..?" He tries to shrug it off as if he's not asking what he's asking. "You like making the rest of us suffer as we watch you...tease."

Kate leans away, her thumb leaving Castle's mouth with a slow wet pop, and her eyes narrow when she realises what he's actually...seriously?

"You don't seem the type to like being claimed." Logan shrugs nonchalantly again...but he's watching and Kate knows. Her hand tightens over Castle's wrist, holds him in place as she lifts her eyes to find his.

"Only by him." She growls darkly, fire through her veins...like he is flooding heat and tension through her entire body coiling in an animalistic and undeniable swirl way down low in the pit of her stomach

Castle steps into her almost instantaneously his hand falling to her waist one fisting in her hair he pulls her face level with his, eyes catching. Watching the way her lids flutter when his fingers skim the back of her neck…and they stand now in the noise and heavy rhythm of the bar almost lip to lip.

"Let's get out of here Rick," she mumbles against his mouth, eyes flashing again.

And he gets it.

She loves that he gets it.

She needs to not blow their cover by going badass Beckett on the son of a bitch standing next him. And he has to pass on the Intel.

Fingers burning through her top he pulls her even closer...stepping them away from the table and pressing her back towards the side exit.

"Alley, _now_." He growls, loud enough that the scum and voyeurs surrounding them prick up their ears, slide a little closer, nod knowingly at each other...

But he doesn't care, because Kate reaches for him, her hands at the collar of his leather jacket, yanking him hard and with a heavy thud they crash into the door.


	18. Chapter Seventeen

**Disclaimer**: I own nothing and no one...But I just wanted to say thank you to everyone reading, reviewing, encouraging ...and occasionally yelling at me :D for those who have had enough of the tease I will say I wrote the end so it's coming fast (stop snickering) but until then, if you're still reading internetly hugs, if you've had enough thanks for coming this far with me ;)

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Seventeen.<strong>

* * *

><p>The second the door slams shut behind them Kate shoves him away. Falling into the wall she presses her flat palms against the brick, seeking the chill to distract her.<p>

Calm her...cool her.

But it does nothing to still her raging heart.

She can't quite force herself to meet his eye, doesn't want the tangled clash of blazing pupils as she tries to catch her breath. And the chill of the air should be helping her, the bite of wind and icy brick should help...

Should...

But it doesn't even really cool down the heat radiating from her hands. Hands that had only seconds before been curled around Castle's...

Kate lets her forehead rest against the building too, eyes closing and breath breaking in painful gasps, fingers scrunching into fists. She thuds her hand hard against the wall before pushing off and stalking away. The raw feelings still rage through her, nothing helping and her voice is molten with need and anger when she speaks.

"What the _hell_ was that?" Kate demands, still marching away. Needing an explanation for the tongue that licked at her finger, the soft wet swirl of his mouth.

Kate needs less conflict in her torn emotions, less desire for questions and less knowledge of the answers, more action...in silence.

Where she doesn't have to think about it.

She needs to not think, not be lost in the unending burn.

Why is he so _hot_?

Not _hot _hot...well, yeah, hot and ugh, she drags her hand through her hair wrecking the curls again. How the fuck does he manage to decimate her undercover character with barely the blink of an eye and the roll of his too talented tongue?

Not only emotionally, as he drags the real Kate to the surface and leaves her bare and gasping in the cold night air. But physically, as she pulls at her clothes, dragging them away from her hot and flushed skin, her hair dishevelled when she slides her hands through it, tussled and far too wanton.

He breaks down the layers, the barriers and shields she erects around herself, and gets at what's underneath, bringing it, her, to life, far too easily.

She needs to know how and _why_?

Wants to watch his lips as the truth spills from them before she covers them, soft and gentle, hard harsh and devouring, with her own. She wants to swallow down his confessions and let the truth settle, sliding low, beating with that internal squeezing pulse.

Let them mix and meld together as she climbs over him, slams her body into him hard and...

Turning suddenly and striding towards Castle, not giving him time to answer, she growls, "What's the plan?"

Kate wants it all, so badly, but she can't hear it now. Can't have more than an unfulfilling taste that will leave her craven and throbbing with desire.

Castle's head snaps up, eyes wide as he dips forwards, "Plan?"

Kate tries not to roll her eyes, tries not to poke him, slap him even as her frustration boils over, "Ryan?" She hisses, "What did he say?"

"DiSilva didn't show yet." Castle shrugs, "He's late, wagons are circling and we need to keep Logan distracted just a little while longer."

Castle shifts, catches her eyes and smirks and Kate knows...something's...happened? Something that makes him giddy. He's enjoying himself far too much for her liking and she's still in the dark about why.

Then his eyes drop, slide steadily down the curve of her neck over the swell of her breasts, and he looks at her like...

Oh.

Realisation hits her hard and she tenses.

"He said..."

"Said we shouldn't have a problem doing that." Castle finishes for her before he drops his hands into his pockets. The fire of his eyes igniting her skin as they trail high once again, until he's staring across the miniscule distance she put between them. "Being as we've been distracting the entire bar all night."

He grins, lopsided, kinked to one side with pride. His lips lift in that gloating, teasing smile that she wants to just...suck into her mouth. Kate wants to swallow down his joy and his smug, obnoxious side, leave him gasping into her as she kisses that stupid look right off of his face. Before she drags his lips between her teeth, biting at the soft skin, making him moan.

Then the door behind him slides open, and the universe proves itself to be an even bigger tease than she is about to be. Tommy Logan steps out into the alley, his eyes focused and seeking...looking for them, staring directly at Kate.

"Oh...fuck." She groans, her fists tight and hard against her thighs, decision made the moment the suspect stepped through the door.

Castle stares, eyes narrowing in confusion and concern, "Kate wha..?"

But the look on her face cuts his words dead, the light in her eyes fierce, almost painful in its penetration, then her body crashes into his again and everything becomes about the touch of her body.

Her fingers slide into his hair, tight, yanking his head down, one fast blink of inevitability before her mouth slides over his, groaning into the hot depths of his mouth when it opens all too willingly and her tongue darts inside.

His hand slides up her back, fisting the cotton of her shirt, his eyes still open, watching, before the roll of her tongue and the scrape of her teeth over his bottom lip force the lids to close on a shudder.

It wracks his body, head to toe.

Castle drags his hand from her side, sliding over the bare skin of her arm, past the bend of her elbow as her fingers coil themselves tight within his t-shirt, up her shoulder, to her neck.

Kate pants around his tongue as he thrusts it back between her parted lips and it's the most beautifully erotic sound he has ever heard her make...at least...so far.

His fingers cup the back of her head, pulling through her hair, the memory of the last time they did this bursting to life in his hands as they move. Castle circles her ear, nails to her scalp in a way that makes her hum, clench and fall into his body all at the same time.

Kate drags against his abdomen, trying to get closer, trying to push him away, just...trying to hold on and breathe past it...breathe at all because air is...what is it again?

She cradles Castle's face in the palm of her hand, her teeth meeting his lip when she bites down and sucks, so much more than she imagined it would be, and air...air is...important.

She needs to breathe, can't let him go but...

With a great panting gasp, they separate. Lungs heaving, hot and used up oxygen cascading between them as they breathe each other in, absorb the very essence of the other in each life affirming lungful.

Castle battles his eyes when they want to close, euphoria flooding his blood, his forehead falling into hers until they are nose to nose in the alley. But he needs to look at her too, truly revel in her, every inch of skin, every beat of her lashes, every gasp of intoxicating breath...

_Only _her.

The only one to truly lull him into silence yet fill his mind so utterly with words, phrases and this...feeling, this need to not stumble anymore.

He wants to verbalise it, breathe it into her skin and whisper the truth into every crevice of her body, her heart and soul. And yes throw her down on a bed or press her against the wall and _brand _it into her for eternity.

The same way he's been scalded by her touch, marks under his skin that will never fade, Castle wants Kate to know. It's beyond time for her to understand what this does to him, to them...

Refusing to step back from her, Castle lets his fingers skim her ear, the delicate shell of soft skin so very appealing under his hand, but he darts past it. Tender touches to her cheek before he slides his thumb across her bottom lip. Wet and glistening with their combined saliva he drags across it, pressing firmly into the plump flesh.

She has the most kissable mouth. Touchable, _devourable_...his thumb traces the line his tongue travelled and though it was mere seconds ago he craves it again, needs her touch, wants...

She heaves a heavy breath, an aching need straight into his face, "Logan." She sighs, almost an apology, but no way in hell is he about to believe that was all for show.

She's brilliant at it, the undercover Beckett, the lies, half truths and deceptions, but she's not that good.

He knows her too well now, and he smiles.

The hand at her back moves, nails scraping, chasing his fingers as they draw a path towards her ass, her hip, clenching tight and dragging her closer.

"Rick," She pleads, her eyes on him, wide and desperate before flicking over his shoulder for the barest hint of a second then they are on his again, "Make it good."

Castle smirks, his mouth descending, _make it good_?

Fuck that.

He's going to make it _extraordinary_.


	19. Chapter Eighteen

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing and no one...but corrupting your own prologue FTW! annnd also excited!

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><p><strong>Chapter Eighteen.<strong>

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><p>It's dark, so much darker than it should be, but the overhead street light has been broken and shards of forgotten glass crunch under her heels as he backs her into the wall.<p>

And god, it just feels so good when his legs crowd hers and he gives her no option, no choice as he keeps striding, keeps forcing her back. Their hips bump and collide until they find their rhythm, thighs aligning, then it's a steady progression.

A deadly dance.

The cold New York brick is suddenly harsh at her back, cutting like icy fingers through the almost sheer material of her black tank top as she nears it. The thin straps clinging to the grooves of her shoulders now, because she has recently tugged them into place but every so often, they slip.

He pushes her, guiding her backwards with his hands at her hips, fingers hot pin pricks on the narrow grooves of her pelvis, moving back until they hit the wall...hard. He notices the strap slip again, the slow progression her hand makes towards sliding it back up.

But he catches her as she reaches for it, stopping her.

Castle laces his fingers through Kate's, soft and slow until their hands slide together and he starts tugging their joined palms down the length of her body. When he reaches her hip he squeezes, traps her hand there for a moment, a warning she heeds lost in the feel of his climbing fingers.

He palms her arm, cups every swell and bump of muscle, following the path with his eyes almost unable to believe he's really his running his hand along Kate's arm. And he turns desperately seeking her face as he takes another step forwards, inching between her legs.

His breath is burning through his chest, twisting almost painfully as it escapes his mouth.

Her eyes lift, bright sparks in the near pitch-black alley, that dart to his lips, to his eyes as he hooks the thin piece of cotton under his index finger and slides it back onto her shoulder, settling it over her now very visible bra strap, black cotton like the tank. He thumbs the material above her skin, catches the absence of street light in her eyes.

She doesn't need it.

She's luminescent enough.

But leaning closer he sees instead the reflection of the skyline, the city lights and its hum dancing across her pupil, contrasting her iris, speckling the brown with hints of gold and red.

She's humming too.

Unable to resist, Castle slips his thumb beneath the material, under both layers as they lay over her shoulder, running the pad across her silky skin. He wants to chase the movement with his mouth, lay his lips, open and wet, over her and taste...

She's warm.

She's not really, it's a trick of the light, or lack thereof, because what she really is, is tingly.

Chilly from the breeze and the fact she is wearing next to nothing, but where his fingers brush the cotton away from her skin there is a blaze, roaring infernos of heat.

Kate shivers, a gentle shudder that wracks her body from head to toe and stutters through her chest, even vibrates the strands of her hair.

His hand stiffens as he feels the ripples pass through her and he lays it flat against her skin, presses his heated, soft palm to her shoulder, flat over her deltoid, no longer trailing, no testing movement.

He just holds her.

"Are you cold?" His voice is gravelly, husky in a way that causes his breath to gust past her cheek. He watches her eyes close as she leans into it, the feel of his exhale against her skin. He does it again.

Because he can now.

She said make it good.

"Kate?"

Her fingers move, rising between them to catch his t-shirt, fisting her hands just inside his jacket, the leather she's so attached to skimming her knuckles and she sighs, pleasure and pain laced through the movement.

He feels her nails trail, sliding to the edge of the thick, shiny material, the soft leather finding her fingers as she clings to it, suspended weights at the base of the zipper and she tugs like she wants it off, teasing, toying.

Castle exhales again, measured, steadying himself against an onslaught of images - her in nothing but his jacket, Kate straddling her bike, his hands sliding under her top, hers slipping under his belt - but then she drops the edges of the material, abrupt and sudden.

Kate lets her hands move underneath, dragging again, wrapping around him.

He feels so good, solid, strong and...hard beneath her fingers. His muscles tense and contract as she slides around to his abdomen, fiddling with the hem of his shirt, lifting it away from his skin.

When Kate can finally open her eyes, lifting her lids to meet his gaze she tilts her head back, rests the base of her skull against the alley wall as she breathes out on a smile.

"Not cold, no." Her hand climbs higher, mirroring the first to slide up his coat and rest against him. Kate tears herself away from the need to slide against his skin and instead focuses on touching as much of him as she can over the thin cotton of the shirt. Her fingers are firm over his chest and hip as she pulls him closer, bringing the warmth and heat with him. "Not now."

Never ever again, judging by the way her blood is boiling, racing high to her cheeks, low to her groin, heavy in her hands and her breasts, her heart wide and bursting and everything, every cell yearning and calling... screaming for him and release.

She will never be cold again, if she survives this night, she will be the charred remnants of a formerly frosty detective.

Kate hums when his lips brush her cheek, his nose to the lobe of her ear before he breathes across her throat, heading for the expanse of skin laid bare shoulder to shoulder.

Kissing her chest is bad enough...good enough...

He's so, so good at...

But then his tongue darts out, thick and wet against her skin and when the air meets the wet trails he leaves behind, she quivers, goosebumps erupting everywhere.

Working his way along her collarbone, teeth to the raging pulse in her throat before he sucks his way just under the groove of her chin, Castle grasps her shoulders and pins her to the wall.

His teeth close harshly, ferociously over a mouthful of Kate Beckett, making her ...

"Fuck." Her grip tightens and her eyes slam shut.

Marking her visibly and indelibly when he bites and sucks in alternating heavenly rhythm, Castle lets his thumbs glide over the tender skin at the inside of her elbows. His mouth opening and closing against the thud of her heart as he traces the lingering sweat, darting out to skirt her cleavage before trailing high again.

Her fingers squeeze tight and he almost freezes...almost.

There is a scuff of noise behind them and her eyes open, falling over his shoulder. Kate focuses on something he can't see. But her fingers are tight against him and he remembers why he's here, realises she does too.

And it matters, all of it, of course it matters...

But Kate makes a noise, shocked as he crowds even closer not missing the fact that her face is at his neck. Her lips move over the tense muscle as she hoists herself up, tugging against him.

"Castle," she hisses, trying to catch her breath. Wanting to lean away when he flinches, but he doesn't give her the chance.

"It's fine just..." His voice cracks, he smiles. He's pressing himself so close and she doesn't need to ask more. She can feel everything he has ever held back and a hell of a lot more when he presses himself between her legs, sliding her thighs apart with a nudge of his knee and stepping into the space created.

"Oh." Kate lets her fingers close against his collar, the only way she has of acknowledging that it's fine, it's perfect and good and no...he doesn't need to...feel guilty or move away, because he shifts like he might and she can't bare it.

Make it good, she begged, make it better her mind screams, make it...real.

His head drops, his brow pressing at the naked edge of her shoulder and he huffs a laugh across her skin, it's not an embarrassed laugh, it's resigned and Castle will never curse his body for reacting to her.

It's natural, her and him, chemistry . Fire.

She doesn't wriggle anymore, just falls still against him, the breath of his laughter across her skin making it hard.

"Oh!"

And there was more than one reason he was pulling back from her, and she just...dragged him closer, made him suffer just a little more with the press of her body as his rose in adoration.

Ardent desire.

Her laughter is a silent shake as she bites her lip, it's all very hard and no wonder he's smirking, no wonder he looks smug. She feels it herself, pride in their connection and the fact she is the one to draw these reactions from him and her hands slide deep beneath his jacket, seeking his warmth, seeking him now, unexpectedly, catching her off guard.

But it doesn't, not really. She wants him as close as he wants her. She wants to be as near as she can be in a darkened alley, nearer than is legally decent...

Screw it.

"More." She feels bad for asking it of him, it's obvious his control is at knife edge anyway but this was his idea, them together, working...playing, and she enjoys pressing his buttons just a bit, the way he does hers.

His hand roams and god, he can press whatever the hell he wants to.

He doesn't argue, doesn't even speak because he's more than willing to dive in. Castle lifts her a little higher, hand slipping over her thigh to hook her leg around his waist. His fingers are firm at the edge of her dark denim shorts, the too short shorts in the still too cold weather, but he loves how exposed she is when dressed like this.

How open her face is when he touches her.

He's shocked when she arches into the wall, letting him grope her hooked leg, and then he's the one gasping, grip tight at her hip and thigh as she kicks off from the ground and anchors herself firmly around his waist again.

He feels her heels catch and lock, dragging his pelvis firmly into hers as she's perched there. His weight keeping her upright, pressing himself against her.

He hears her exhale against his neck, ragged breath, like she doesn't care that her mouth is against his skin.

A gruff noise rips from his throat, and she giggles, presses her face to his ear and whispers, teasing and conspiring.

With him and against him.

"Don't hold back." She groans and when his eyes flash to hers in disbelief, looking for confirmation, assurance that she means it, Kate slides higher against his chest and gives him everything he needs in three little words, "Cos I won't."


	20. Chapter Nineteen

**Disclaimer: I own nothing and no one.**

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><p><strong>Chapter Nineteen.<strong>

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><p><em>She's gonna be my Midnight Queen.<em>

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><p>No, she won't.<p>

No more holding back, she will have him in any way, shape or form she can and right now if that means grinding against him in the middle of the street then so be it. Her hand in his hair moves, opens, closes, palm and fingers clenching around him exactly how the rest of her wants to be.

Her muscles cry out and she's arching, losing the battle to just give in and ride him.

Tight, she squeezes him tight, her ankles at his back pulling him closer so she can press herself, moist and aching and...Oh...just...

"Ri..." She can't force his name from her lips because they start to shudder, above and below, just from the...just from the closeness of him. Her thoughts slipping just a bit in the heated dance as impulse takes over and Kate heaves in a breath, tugs his head back and catches his eyes.

The burn of his pupils.

Smouldering.

He blazes through her entire body with that penetrating, invading look, he misses nothing, hears her hiss and her sensual almost moan of his name and knows that all she wants is sex.

Please god yes, just...yes now, here, there, whatever...

It's deserted, in this cold dark alley, well not really, but enough, so it's fine, but even if they were standing back in the middle of the crowded dance floor it wouldn't make a difference.

Kate wants him.

She wants Castle.

She's too far gone, has been for longer than she's probably truly aware of, but tonight the fever burns too brightly and one or other of them is going to spontaneously combust if they keep this up...

The tease with no resolution.

The touching that leads to...nothing but arousal and cold showers and watching your partner and imagining every move they make is being made naked. Every bend and flex of muscle could be made against your own skin, and she wants it, him, so much..so so...

His tongue darts out, traces the line of her lower lip and her eyes slam shut. Kate tries to breathe, her mouth falling wide to suck in the hot exhales of her partner, any air a blessing to calm her and soothe...

But it's no use.

The second her lips part Castle invades instead, ignoring her gasp, feeding from her mouth almost lazily, frenzied at the same time, a contradiction, an enigma...a fucking genius when his fingers trail her sides, light over her ribs to palm her breast.

Just what she needs, how she likes and she curls into him, swallowing the molten swirl of their dancing tongues and lathing his cheeks and his lips, holding him tight and letting him devour her.

His thumb grazes her nipple, a shallow slide across the protruding flesh as every little part of her comes to life and rises and reaches for him.

All of him, she wants all of him.

He does it again, slowly, deliberately, so she flinches, the feeling too much, him there, touching her like this, too much and she can't...but it's too late because he does it again.

Castle circles her nipple with the pad of his thumb, rolling the bud before he tweaks it and her hands cradle his face, his ears trapped under her palms and she wants to pinch him for pulling the keening cry from her, the one that screams 'Take me' even to her own ears.

But he pulls back, his hand leaving her swollen skin, the fistful of her shirt and bra and quivering breast that felt too damn good in his hand and she growls into his mouth in protest.

Yes, fine, fine, she's lying to herself when she thinks about making him stop, because god she doesn't want...never ever wants him to do that.

Hot and wet and kissing her back with long battling waves of his tongue, he's mean to give her that deadly touch and then take it away so easily and...Oh...

His hand is shoving her shirt up and she understands now.

She gets it...gets him.

He needs, wants, must have actual skin beneath his fingers and his entire hand, huge and deliciously frightening with its restrained power, slides across her stomach. His hot palm covers her belly button and the muscles in her abdomen ripple sparking to life at the contact. His fingers slide, smoothing over her skin and curling around her waist until he's holding her firm and then he moves his thumb.

One talented little digit that rocks her entire world when it glides under her bra, his nail teasing aside the underwire to find warmth and sweat and raw naked flame that he throws gasoline on with the press of his...

"God." She gasps, dragging her mouth away from his, wet lines laced between them and she drags air into her lungs in three, short sharp sucks before she falls back into the waiting cavern of his open lips.

Instead of diving back into that heated fight of tongues and teeth, Kate kisses at the outer edge of his lips, soft and hard at the same time, in rhythm with her surging body as she rides his waist and every time she rises up he squeezes, presses and teases her breast, and every time she slams back down their lips connect for the briefest, barest of seconds, before they do it all again.

And he touches her so tenderly when he should be hard...

But fuck actually he is hard, right there where she needs him to be, but not...

Kate lets her heel slide, presses it into his thigh and moulds her body to Castle's, the thick wall of his chest her anchor and his neck...

She shoves aside the leather, soft and pliable and so good under her fingers, finding his throbbing pulse, meeting her beat for beat and her mouth falls across it.

He tastes so good.

Like fire and smoke and conflict...like truth in the moment.

Like banter and teasing and fighting and coffee and... no, no of course he doesn't taste like any of these things, it's all in her head, fuelled by the fire in her veins.

He tastes like sweat and longing and...Castle.

And Logan's watching, lurking in the shadows a trail of smoke rising from him and she should feel dirty or indecent that he's leaning against the wall staring at them like his own private porn show, that this all started because of him, but she can't...won't.

Castle flexes his knees, dipping low, rising up and...

"Fu..." His mouth falls over hers and steals the words and the expletives that burst from her tongue, her soul when he moves and catches at vibrations raging, pulsing between her legs.

Kate swirls her own tongue in response, bites at his mouth, grips tight to his shirt and lifts herself, clawing at him in desperation to get closer, climbing him to sate the need to swallow him whole as it drips through her veins.

Drips down low, lower still and drenches her entire body, she's flooded with need and desire and hell yes lust and she wants to drown in it...drown him in it.

Lifting, his hands slide under her ass to hold her, catch her weight as she slams back down, her feet gliding over the backs of his legs as she uses him for leverage to heave herself up and down.

And when she slams down the next time, Kate drops her hands between them, grazing her bare legs until she catches his belt buckle and tugs.

And it's this movement alone that proves to him she means it.

Don't hold back..because she won't.

And when has he ever known her to hold back? She goes at everything with head down steely gazed determination and this...this faux fucking...

She's a damn fine actress. She should be in films, she should be on the stage.

No screw that she should be in his bed because that moan...that hiss, she can't be faking it.

"God...Ri..." Her teeth bite down hard against his neck and he thrusts into her, jerks his body, rolls his hips against his own control and feels her stutter in shock in his arms.

She clings to him again, jerks back and her skin feels slick under his hands. He escapes the confines of her top, ignores her pleas and whimpers as he retreats and takes a different path.

Make it good.

That's what she said, and she moans again, shallow into his ear, lashes beating against his cheek as she rocks, rolls and bounces.

She's a tease.

And a damn good one.

But this is more than that and Castle reads it, so blatant and clear in every movement.

"Kate." He growls, a threat, a promise all at once and with one hand at the back of her head now, the other squeezes the skin of her ass suddenly exposed to the night air by her position.

Such a wonderful position.

Because wrapped around him like this, when his hands move and start to roam her skin, there's not much she can do besides cling to him and pull herself closer.

Castle can't reach enough of her skin though, the swell of her cheek through the denim taunts him and he moves, nails trailing the seams at the centre of the shorts, making her hiss, making her shiver and her tongue...she rolls it right around his in this vicious swirl. Sucking on the muscle as if she wants to be sucking on something else and he finally finds his way to the leg of her shorts.

Sliding his fingers under the edge...too tight, Castle wonders why she isn't wearing a skirt, a skirt would make this so much easier.

Because he could just roll it higher, shove her underwear aside and...

But he's not actually going to fuck her in an alley...it's pretense...it's show, but damn if he doesn't want to make all real.

"Later," She groans understanding completely, and it nearly undoes him, the weeping ache in her voice the rawness and the gravel that make words rough, the dark manic edge that proves she means it, "After...Cas...Rick...we..."

She shakes her head, her hair flying in soft waves around his face colliding with the muffled laugh of resignation and shock that leaves her chest.

Fisting a handful of her hair between his fingers, knuckles white, Castle draws her head back slowly, waiting until she forces her eyes open. Pitch black in the darkness, she's regal and magnificent, lording her passion over him like Queen of the night.

Midnight Queen, with her dangerously alluring siren song.

But he knows a few tunes of his own.

Tilting her head back, tugging at the silken rope of her hair that he has wound between his fingers, he angles her head. Lining her mouth up with his own, just how he wants her before he leans in and breathes across her lips. "Now, Kate...now." And he thumbs open the snap of her shorts.


	21. Chapter Twenty

**There is an alternate version of this chapter which is being posted separately, I changed my mind in regards to the direction of where it was going at the last minute...but it's there to read if you wana :D  
><strong>

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><p><strong>Chapter Twenty.<strong>

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><p><em>She's gonna climb all over me.<em>

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><p>His mouth closes over hers and the zip slides low, his hand grazing against the warmth and quivering skin just below her stomach as he reaches to press aside her underwear just as he imagined doing earlier...<p>

Only...only it's all for show and instead of sliding his hands inside her shorts, he catches her eye, sees her understanding, resignation that yeah they are about to cross another line and get a hell of a lot closer.

But not actually as close as they want to be.

Kate leans into him again, firm weight in his hands and at his shoulders as she peers past him eyes on the suspect, before sliding her lips over Castle's again. A shallow moan breaks from her and he swallows it fast, not wanting to give it up to some perverted criminal lowlife watching from the shadows.

All the wonderful parts of her in his arms, all the secrets of them together...he will never share, refuses to in fact, but he still needs more.

His fingers slide past the denim and instead of delving in, meeting cotton or silk Castle finds himself imagining his fingers dancing through molten velvet.

Wet heat.

Best fucking book title ever.

And he cups her through the material, not as thick as it makes out because as he stirs against her, Castle can still feel every intimate line and dip, every crevice and groove of her body, the heat pooling directly above his hand.

Warm and...wet.

His fingers still in shock, frozen when he finds her so ready and exposed like this and he forces himself to pull back, not from the lips he's teasing with his fingertips through the barely there denim, but from the ones he's kissing.

He sucks her bottom lip as he retreats, a farewell for the moment as he waits for her eyes, for her accusation or denial.

But before their lips are fully separated Kate's chasing the kiss, her hips gyrating in slow circles and she presses down hard against his hand. Any closer...with nothing between them and she would be forcing his fingers to part her quivering lips and delve deeply inside, into the dark wet fire that would shiver all round his invading digits.

"Don't...don't stop." She pleads, as if he could, and he growls directly into her mouth. His hips rock and he lifts her just a little more, thuds her backwards into the wall and no doubt bruises her. But with a thick swirl of his fingers, pressing tight to the seam until she gasps, he promises to every vibrating cell in her body, he'll make it up to her.

Make it worthwhile.

Make it real.

Later when it's just them alone in the swirling heat of his bedroom and he can properly take his time over this, not worry about being watched...not that he is, but he should...their first time means more than this.

"Never." He states fiercely, eyes on hers, seeing into her even though her lids are fused shut. Castle reads the pink tinge to her cheeks and the line of her lips as they part so very closely to his and she wets them with her tongue before breathing across the glistening trail.

She's panting against him.

It's beautifully sensual, sexy and Castle has never seen anything quite like it, the way she gives in but gives back, and he wants more of it. Everything she offers up.

Somewhere in private where she doesn't have to bite her lip, force down moans and keep her eyes over his shoulder for danger, somewhere she can scream out...god he wants to hear her scream.

His hand at her waist holds Kate in place and Castle braces a knee against the wall, lets her weight fall a little into the thick muscle of his thigh, pressing his hand ever closer through her thin stupid shorts and...

"Oh..." Her teeth bite down on the leather of his jacket and she cries into shiny black material as he presses his fingers back a little, his movement spreading her hips and opening her up to his invasion before he steps into her, closer...impossibly there is still space between them and he wants it gone.

She thrills at it

She starts to moan, a deep rumble of surprise and joy that shocks Castle just...just a bit because - he pulls back, watches the flint sparks of orgasmic bliss behind her pupils- they were acting, putting on a show and this...this is so much more than that.

They come together, bodily, hard and firm and he pushes...

Up and...

Their eyes lock in sudden shock, her mouth opening, lips parting on a heavy breath and surely...

"Beck...Kate...are you not...wearing...?" He can't complete the sentence, doesn't need an answer he's already far too aware of the truth.

Biting down hard on her exposed lip she shakes her head, lost in the feeling of his hand and his smell and him just...there and...

"Shit." He breathes against her neck in apology, his hand sliding away because it's not fair, to him or her, but mostly her, exposed and vulnerable and him taking advantage in the...

"Shhh..." Her hand slides around his neck, dragging his mouth back to hers and with every millimeter that separates them disappearing as she pulls him close, Kate focuses on his lips, his soft sweet devilish lips... "No...just..."

His eyes open wide and he looks devastated that she's telling him no and no no no not no like that, she squeezes her eyes together quick and sharp before she looks at him again, pleading with her wide open heart for him to realise she means no don't stop because god...please don't stop.

And she thrusts her body forwards, down hard into his hand, her chest bumping his, her mouth opening and her tongue...Sliding over his lips, a deep and breathy sigh invading his mouth before she takes its place and kisses him hard.

The muscles in her legs, the whole of her body, clamp tight around him because no, no stopping and he feels so good, so right and warm and he catches on, finally understands that it's ok.

More than ok...better...the best...well not yet but...soon.

Castle tugs her hair, pulls her face back from his so he can kiss her neck, lips forceful over her skin now, confident and holding her in place so he can trace whatever path he chooses over her body.

Kate clings to his shoulder, her eyes closing as emotion and feeling take control, overwhelming and intense, her hand drifts through his hair so she can tug him away or hold on tight, but she does neither, can't bring herself to force him away, can't quite centre herself enough to hold on.

Instead Kate finds her hand caressing his head, sliding past his ear and down the back of his skull, her thumb grazing his jaw and her long slender fingers finding home in the tight muscle of his neck. Hard and firm and soft under her fingers and she falls forwards.

Because as she moves, so does he and he's so much better at the touch and tease than she is right now, incoherent and captive to the rhythm that beats between them.

"Fuck..." She moans, directly into his ear, and she can't help herself when her lips close over the lobe and she sucks him in time with the pulse of his fingers against her. She's not sure if he's doing it on purpose but the pretense is enough, just his hand resting almost frozen between her legs now, is enough.

Him holding her is enough. But then he speaks.

"Oh we will..." He groans, and yeah he smirks just a bit when his words, so honest and true and filthy cause her to clench around him in response.

In anticipation.

Because this...this is...

There is no going back from this.

It's inevitable where they will end up, tonight or tomorrow or the next day...hopefully all three, and maybe it always has been but now...

"Oh..."

But he's moving again and his thumb is sliding just above the pressure of his fingers. Intent on his face as he focuses on her, don't hold back...

She said that.

And Kate clings, drowning in surprise and delight, terror and jubilation, as he takes her at her word, weighed down with desire and bursting with pleasure, gasping when he presses through the cloth once, twice, three times and stops...circles and does it all again.

And it's...it's everything and it's Castle, and Kate searches his face when she opens her eyes, leaning away from the warmth of his chest and the blistering heat of his mouth, wanting to lose herself in pools of the blue waiting for her.

Only they aren't there, that gentle blue and soft, almost angelic...

Well not really because it's still Castle. But she wants the deep swirl of misty blue, ready and waiting for her to fall into.

Because she will fall...soon.

But it's not there, and what she finds instead is so much more intoxicating.

That tender edge to his eyes when he looks at her is gone, washed away by his dark almost demonic desire to have her, his need for her so evident in the unshakable way he stares at her.

Watching the pleasure he gives her roll across her body, surrounding her, bathing her just as she desperately aches to bathe him. The weeping evidence of her enjoyment dripping into his waiting hands or wrapping around him hotly in a vice like glove of lust and want, surrendering as he drives into her, capturing him and making him hers.

Kate can see every lingering fantasy, past and present, even the ones bursting to life as he touches her, and each one ripples across his face with urgency before he forces it aside and delves back into the here and now...into her.

She can see his, and she levels him with an open wide and staring gaze, letting him see a few of her wants and desires as they are ignited by the spark of his own.

Partners in everything, even this...this storytelling.

Lost in the fiction of each other until they can make it a reality.

And Kate's blinking rapidly, she must be because one moment he is holding himself away, watching her reactions, taking in what she likes and how she moans, and the next his lips are resting over hers, not quite touching.

Hot air dancing between them.

And Kate, desperately clinging on to what little control she has left over her body, tries to remember that it's for show and that Logan is a few feet away and they are supposed to be trapping him, distracting him.

And surely this is a distraction.

But for who?

Because their eyes are open and staring, lashes tangling with each beat and he waits, just a second, just a pause against the quiver of her skin before he lines her lip with his tongue and teases his way inside.

Castle rolls, and tenses, mouth pressing, lips soft and firm against each other and when she shivers his fingers freeze no longer dragging liquid fire from her body.

Her hands claw through his hair, tugging and sliding, caressing and demented in equal measure, everything a balance, but the scales are tipping and Kate feels herself twisting ever closer to falling over the edge.

And he stops...

Dropping down, Kate shudders, eyes closing, panting his name just once into his mouth before she loses herself in him completely. He doesn't even have to move anymore, she's too far gone. But every time she thinks exactly that, Castle pushes her further, overflowing with the remnants of his touch and his mouth moving under hers.

Nothing like she ever imagined it would be.

Who could picture this in a million years? And it's so much more than she ever expected. So much touching when they have existed on none, their lips moving and moulding, colliding when they have always been reliant on the verbal battle not the physical onslaught.

And their eyes...

They communicate the most and it's the one thing that will never change between them, no matter how close they get, no matter how tight and hard and perfect...that positive charge when their eyes lock, it will never fade.

Castle watches, like he always does, observes the shake and the shudder, absorbs the tension that rolls from her in waves, his eyes refuse to tear themselves away from her as she drags them towards the edge of something new.

So far beyond everything they were before.

And she kisses him like her life depends on it, because now and oh so suddenly, in new and shiningly vivid ways it truly does. Castle holds the key to her pleasure and her heart all within his wonderful, evil, hands and she kisses him...like she's wanted to for as long as she can remember.

Kate breathes through him, fire in her body, flames licking everywhere they touch and she sets him alight with every contraction of her muscles.

Every touch another flame.

Lips sliding together she feels the approaching rush of dizzying energy, it pulls her back from him, sends her reeling into his chest again and again and she rides the steady rhythm. But he's ready so...ready and when she loses her way, lost in the stumbling ecstasy and the frenetic charge, he's there.

Her...

"Castle..." She gasps, louder than she means to.

Her partner.

And when her eyes open, misty and unfocused, it takes her a second to realise she's staring directly into the face of their suspect, leering and snide as he raises his gun, a sharp metallic click drowning out her near ecstatic panting breaths before he presses the weapon into the back of Castle's skull.

"See...I knew you looked familiar." He shakes his head at her, and she can feel Castle jump, shock and the electric pang of fear snap sharply through him and Kate squeezes where her fingers rest, trying to reassure him.

Which is ridiculous because there is a gun pressed against the back of his...

Her eyes meet Logan's with unmasked anger, feral hatred, and she will rip him limb from limb if he so much as...

Logan laughs, "Yeah, you should be mad, but not at me, at your own stupidity... but we can talk about that after your partner pulls his hand outta your pants..._Detective_."


	22. Chapter Twenty One

**Chapter Twenty One.**

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><p>Her feet thud to the floor, heavy with anger and desperation as she slides down his body and Castle's hands glide around her waist. Holding her up until she finds her balance.<p>

Her knees are weak, stupidly because she got carried away and now because of her, their cover is blown and their suspect is holding a gun to the back of...

"You ok?" Castle breathes and her head lifts, seriously?

He can't...he can't just do that, be fine and calm and normal and fucking protective when she's the one...the reason...

She nods, kicking aside the bar slut Kate persona and dragging awake the fierce detective, putting her to the forefront. Because she can't...she won't lose him.

Lead through her body and iron in her bones, fire in her eyes and all she needs is that thought, him gone because of her, and she finds her feet properly.

Kate gives another sharper nod in Castle's direction and her eyes fall over his shoulder to Logan, he presses the gun again, hard, and Castle flinches.

"Turn around." Logan mutters, his voice still laced through with humour, he finds it's funny...them here like this, and his gun...

She can't focus on that.

Has to focus on that because...

Castle moves away from her, turns and tries to block her body with as much of his as he can. And she wants to roll her eyes and break his kneecaps at the same time.

Idiot.

Fool of a man.

This is her job, her calling, her life and he can't just march in and step in front of her...save her if it all goes wrong.

She won't watch him die because of her.

"I knew you looked familiar," Logan states again, for what, the third time now? And she watches as he drops the gun a little, his aim moving away from Castle's head, more at his throat.

Better...

Still not good.

"At first I thought it was the body," He looks Kate up and down, not registering as she moves, infinitesimal steps around Castle, her nails harsh and biting to his hand when he tries to stop her. "Maybe the hair...the eyes." He shakes his head, "Something..."

"I mean you're hot..." He grins, lecherous and menacing waving the gun a bit, it's trajectory moving from throat to chest and back again as he speaks. "You know that, we both know _he _ knows that," Logan points to Castle, the butt of the gun thrust too damn close to his face and Kate bites back the growl that wants to erupt from her chest. "But still...I've seen hotter..."

Castle makes a noise under his breath and...

Really Castle? Thats the issue you have here?

She holds his hand tighter pleading through the press of her red hot fingers for him to not do anything stupid.

"But you were on that bar with the...dark one...the shorter...he a cop too?" Logan leers forwards, tilting his head. "Don't wana lie." He threatens, raising the gun again and Kate nods.

And really what has she go to lose now? He's exposed himself, Logan's given himself away so perfectly that it's almost as if she planned it and she adapts, moves past her mistake as best she can.

"Yes. He's a cop."

Logan smiles, smirks even, pleased with himself, "Thought so...See I'm not stupid." He turns just enough that Kate can move again, half a step and she's shielding at least half of Castle, even if his grip is crushing her hand, her bones flaking to pieces under his determination to hold her in place at his side...not his human shield.

"One night you're here with...the short one." He smirks, "And I looked and I watched, but you weren't really all that interesting," He laughs now, "But then this one walks in," He waves the gun at Castle again, "And you trade in the other cop." He shakes his head at them, as if admonishing them for being foolish, _tut tut detective, what were you thinking?_

Kate glares, wanting desperately to fold her arms and stare him down, but she won't let go of Castle's hand, she needs that anchor, needs to know where he is so he can't...

"I just knew...I'd seen you...the_ two _ of you together before." Logan sounds almost proud of himself, still smiling, still waving that fucking gun and Kate stares, measured breath and tense fingers doing nothing at all.

"Fucking cops." Logan barks.

"Lots of cops here tonight Tommy." She tells him darkly, trying to buy them time. Because it's true and back up...is...should be...just around the corner. "DiSilvas already in custody." She lies now, not caring. "You're next, Tommy, you should give yourself up." She takes a slow step forwards, "Put the gun down."

Logan laughs. "You think it's that simple." He waves his gun again, what the fuck is he doing because it dances across her face, Castles' arm and neck and chest and the safety's off...has he never held a weapon before, or has he lost it completely?

She weighs her options.

Can she take him down?

She can...he's tall but not that big, skinny, and one swift kick, she could have him on the ground, pin him, but that gun, and Castle wouldn't stand idle at her side.

Should she?

She can't, it's too risky...

Too risky not to...

And fuck it's all her fault.

And Gates had a point...they are deadly together, all consuming and...it's her fault she got caught up in it all...Lost in his touch.

She's a fool.

Kate lets her fingers bite into Castle's in retaliation for his death grip on her hand, and if she's a fool so is he because he got just as carried away as she did, but he's hers. And Kate hasn't had nearly enough of him yet, her body a live wire of crackling energy.

She will not lose him.

"The people I work for..." Logan smiles at her almost sadly, and oh this is the part where she's supposed to feel sorry for him, for the mess he's made of his life. And she doesn't, she knows his history, and Kate holds his eyes as he speaks the half twisted truth. "They don't take no for an answer."

"And you'd never say no would you Tommy." She berates, with a sad half smile, how many times has she heard this crap before? Kate leaves his eyes and trains her focus back on the gun as he steps away.

Logan laughs bitterly, "Given that his fingers are probably still _wet _ I hardly think you're one to be lecturing me on the morals and virtues of being good and saying_ no_."

Castle tenses next to her, a quick squeeze of her arm and for a moment she thinks he's offended...

And then she sees it...

Catches the sudden flash of movement out of the corner of her eye and knows all she has to do is buy a little more time.

She barks a laugh, pretty genuine actually because it's all so fucking ridiculous. "You thought that was real?" Kate laughs again, tips her head to one side and exaggerates a wink. "I'm undercover." She shrugs, "I know how to put on a good act Tommy, they practically teach it from day one at the academy."

Logan, scoffs and laughs himself, dry and bitter, ignoring her words, "But you know what I don't get?"

He waits clearly wanting a response, and Kate breathes, battles with how long she can hold him off before she gives in and shrugs again, enough of an answer for him.

"What mother fucking moron sends a cop who got splashed across the papers for getting shot and a best selling author, undercover?"

"That would be me." Captain Gates voice fills the narrow alley with such force and intensity that Logan spins on the spot, in shock, to face her.

She stands in the shadowed half light of the dank alley way, her red suit tight across her shoulders as she holds her gun with ease and capability, even though she's not dressed to be on the streets.

But she's clearly prepared, her weapon trained on the man before her and a smile of self assurance bright on her face. "Put the weapon down Mr. Logan." She growls, proving once and for all that she's earned her nickname, deserves every inch of it for her unflinching resolve, the fire and steel through her voice, the bite to her menacing words.

Her eyes blink steadily as she holds her stance, unwavering.

Then before Kate can react, before she can launch herself at Logan and pin his ass to the ground, before she can slap the cuffs on him and send him away, before any of that happens, she is shoved sideways, hitting the wall hard.

"No!" She barks, turning fast, but not fast enough. Arms reaching...

Castle moves, thundering across the short distance between them and the suspect with narrow minded focus. He draws back his hand, a feral snarl leaving his chest and he lets loose.

Kate stares in shock as he takes out Logan's knee, at the same time punching him in the jaw, Castle's hand connecting with a sickening crunch to the side of Logan's face and with a thud the man reels, heading into the ground.

Rolling as he pitches forwards, Logan turns and reaches for Castle, grabbing a handful of his leather jacket and pulling until they both drop heavily to the concrete below.

They roll.

Logan landing on top of Castle, reaching with the hand that holds the gun...

Kate moves forwards, desperate to get close, get between them.

But it's no use.

They roll again and Castle brings his knees up, falling across Logan's chest, his hands scrunch at the man's head and he forces it down, a hard smack into the cold slabs beneath him.

Castle's hand collides with Logan's jaw again.

At the same time Logan brings his fist up and slams it into Castle's face.

Both men's heads snap back.

Kate lifts her eyes, feet moving as she flings herself forwards, focused on getting the men separated and Castle safe. But it's all happening so horrendously fast and before she takes a step the terrifying sound of a gunshot echoes through the alley.


	23. Chapter Twenty Two

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing and no one. But I have to say thank you to every one of you guys reading and reviewing. When this story crossed 500 reviews the noises that left my mouth probably convinced everyone in the vicinity that my destiny lies in the insane asylum. But as long as they give me access to a tv and occasionally a pen i'll be a happy Caskett shipping bunny! So, again, thank you :D

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><p><strong>Chapter Twenty Two.<strong>

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><p>"He's down..."<p>

Kate's eyes snap to Gates, but her gun is still held in front of her, pointing to the ground, no trail of smoke and the woman's eyes are narrowed in confusion.

Oh, god...no no...

"Beckett!"

Oh...god.

She stumbles forwards, but Esposito shoves her aside, Ryan on his heels, followed by some detective from Vice with hard eyes and Mick the bartender.

They do what she couldn't, and throw themselves into the struggle of the two men in front of her.

Blocking her view.

Shielding her eyes...her heart...is he?

He can't be...

But there was a...gunshot...

No...

Words filter in, but she stands staring.

"We got confirmation?" The guy from Vice barks. His head twisting to Espo as he pulls Logan to his feet. Shoving him into the wall before snapping the cuffs on him.

"Yeah Uni took him down, shot to the knee. He's in a bus."

The guy from Vice leads Logan away, reading him his rights, ignoring the man as he glances at Beckett and mutters under his breath, "Acting my ass."

"Detective..."

Too many questions.

"Beckett?"

Not now, because...

"Kate..."

There is a breathless rush...she feels dizzy.

Kate?

...Wait he said...

Ryan steps in front of her and she shoves him aside, stumbling past him, desperately seeking to soothe her heart as it tears itself into jagged shreds deep inside her chest.

Her eyes search in panicked sweeps for signs of blood, for all the things she fears, only to find Castle sitting up cross legged on the dirty ground, one hand over a cut above his eye and blood trickles from the corner of his lip, but no where else.

Kate feels the burning breath in her lungs rip its way free and she stutters, falters in her stride and crumbles, dropping down in front of him, landing heavily on her knees. One hand rises to press at the side of his face and the other grabs at his jacket so she can pull herself closer, stare into his eyes, not caring who sees or where they are.

She just needs to know, to be sure.

He's fine?

Is he fine?

He looks fine...a little battered but...she heard...

Flinging his arms aside suddenly she has to look at his chest, roam over the tight shirt and make sure there is no blood...because...she heard...and...

Her hands press firmly, over his abdomen, up to his neck and down, pushing aside the leather to search, to check...to be sure.

Her hands shake, the barest hint of movement but she can feel every quiver...relief, anger, frustration, mind altering joy. Her palms suddenly on fire with the feel of his heart beneath them, strong and true...alive.

And she stops moving, freezes on the spot, ignoring the cold ache in her knees, the rawness of grazed skin where she fell. And instead she stares into the brilliant blue eyes of her partner, each and every one of his heart beats pounding through her as if it were her own.

Castle groans, and forces himself to his knees, "Hey Beckett," He shrugs, his hand still over his eye, scrunching his lips into a quick pout that falls away rapidly when he looks up finally and finds her face.

Her hands lie still but her eyes, her beautiful shining eyes, are wide and raw naked emotion bleeds from them with every second she stares at him.

She looks devastated...crushed and exhilarated all at the same time.

He knows that look too well, he wore it himself for longer than he cares to remember, and his hand rushes up from the ground, where it had fallen to steady his balance.

He reaches for her but she blinks as if suddenly realising where she is, someone clears their throat.

And fuck, just like that, they are back to this crap again.

Castle sighs heavily, resigning himself to the loss of contact and the honesty of her body in motion, and he forces his own undercover persona back into play, the one he wears all day _everyday_.

The one he was allowed to shuck for a few sparse hours over two stupidly short days, when he got to touch her how he wanted, when he wanted.

He gives it up, for her, for the waiting eyes, and steps back into the role he plays so well.

"Little help?" He moans pitifully, trying to break the tension, offering her his hand in hopes she will take it, pull him to his feet and just...let them get back to where they were ten minutes ago...maybe not _exactly _ ten...his hands had been in delightfully warm places, but where they have been the last two days.

Where it was heated and dangerous and honest and good.

* * *

><p>She huffs, a painful breath, a near sob that leaves her chest aching when she forces it back down inside, and her knuckles start to burn under the force of her grip on his jacket. He's pressing her away, just enough that he can extend his hand, and she really should take it.<p>

Only she can't. She can't bring herself to let distance fall between them.

But she has to, and leaning away she can't help it, she checks him over with her eyes again, he's...ok.

He's really, honestly fine and Kate reaches out her hand, fingers firm and true as they curl...

Into a fist and she punches him in the shoulder.

"OW Beckett...what the hell?" Castle lifts his head, his arm darting out to protect his injured body from her onslaught, hurt and confusion playing behind his eyes, and she doesn't care.

She pushes him back again. Hard, so he loses his balance and teeters on the spot, watching her. Her fist connects with his shoulder yet again, only this time she scrunches a handful of his shirt in her fingers and drags him closer, breathes him in as she seethes her anger directly into his face.

"I thought he _shot_ you." She barks, shoving him away and jumping to her feet, dragging her hands through her hair, ruffling hard at her scalp as she tries to shake off the lingering traces of thinking he was dead.

Dead...on the street because...She let herself get lost in his touch.

How does he not get that?

The ragged pain burns through her chest at the mere thought of it...him gone...

"Uniform took down DiSilva out front." Espo pipes up.

Kate suddenly realises, registers properly the presence of her team in the alley. She brushes her hands over her bare arms as she starts to feel the chill and Kate loathes the fact they aren't alone, but she's so grateful for it at the same time.

"Made a mess of some bikes too, shot out a tyre and there is a whole heap of gas that...hey you didn't ride here tonight did...?"

"No." Kate bites out striding away, as if she's worried about her bike right now. She's too busy taking in the information, forcing her heart to unclench and believe that he's ok, and she turns back, needing to see him, only to find Castle rising to his feet with the aid of Ryan.

It pangs painfully through her chest that she's not the one to help him stand, but she can't move...not yet. So she contents herself to watch and know he's ok.

When Kate lets her eyes slide past Castle to Ryan she's shocked to find him glaring at her, eyes harsh for a second with judgement and he shakes his head like she's done something wrong. And Kate swallows thickly before she looks away, looks back to Castle instead.

He really is fine.

"...Taking Logan downtown Detective." Gates is talking, holstering her gun and once it's safely out of sight she waves her hand at them, glaring angrily at Castle, "And he needs to leave."

"He's part of the team." Kate barks, her hands on her hips. Anger boiling through, charring and searing a path from the worried workings of her mind to the tips of her Castle-less fingers. "And he's bleeding."

Her hands clench in on themselves as she grips her own hips to keep from reaching for him.

It's not enough.

It never was before and now...now she knows it never will be again.

Not having him isn't an option anymore.

It's a choice.

"I can't go home like this." Castle states, looking down at himself, his deep and familiar voice rousing her from her head enough to turn and take him in.

"There's an ambulance out front." Espo breathes, his voice slipping through the alley tentatively to stand at her side, he nudges her with his elbow and Kate steps forwards.

"Very well Mr. Castle." Gates says, stomping towards them. "Go get cleaned up, " she looks up at him, scrunches her nose as if disgusted, "You are bleeding on my crime scene."

Castle nods, knowing he will pay for his actions later, in more ways than one.

And he steps around the woman, flicking his eyes towards Kate, expectant and hopeful.

He's an idiot.

She rolls her eyes, of course she's going with him.

"Beckett."

Fuck!

"We need to _talk_." The Captains eyes widen, eyebrows raising significantly, and Beckett can see an _' I told you so._' speech coming from a mile off.

But now is not the time.

"Castle is..."

"A big boy." Gates states condescendingly, "I'm sure he is capable of making his own way..."

"He was injured in the middle of our undercover op..._Sir_." Beckett states forcefully, re-crossing her arms in front of her chest. Knowing how very fond of procedure her Captain is, she's playing a tricky game.

The two women stare at each other. Neither willing to back down, no foreseeable compromise, until...

"Ryan can take him." Kate barks, and she can practically hear the heads snap in her direction in confusion, even the Captain looks surprised that she's given in.

But Kate lets her hand slide through her hair again as she turns from their waiting anxious eyes, she doesn't even contemplate looking at Castle, instead she focuses on seizing at whatever small victory she can grasp in the moment.

More concerned for him than her own stupid pride.

"I...fine, yes, Detective Ryan..." Gates, gives in, nodding at the man she receives a quiet yes in acknowledgement, and then she walks away.

Expecting Kate to follow.

With one last, lingering look over her shoulder Kate takes in his bloody knuckles, anger rising through her chest again, the graze to his cheek, the swollen eye...he could have been shot...the bleeding lip.

It could be worse.

But it's bad enough.

He opens his mouth to speak, his back to the bar and Ace in the Hole still thudding away with the cretins and creeps that inhabit it, just behind the four of them as they stand in the alley, but she cuts him off.

Now is not the time.

"Go," She says forcefully, quietly, her eyes flicking from Castle's still trickling lip to Ryan at his side. "Just...just go." And she turns away, blocking the images from her head. Every step she takes echoes with the words_ he's fine_.

That and the fierce buzz that still roars through her pulse, are the only things that keep her moving away from Castle and towards her waiting Captain.

* * *

><p>She squeezes the plastic cup in her hands, stares down into the murky depths at the cheap and thoroughly unappealing coffee, before she shudders.<p>

All around them lights are flashing, reflecting in vivid blue and red splashes off of the already brightly lit building. Voices are barking, cat calls and threats, cracking under the pressure, laughing at the spectacle.

The hum of danger and excitement fills the air, it sparks all around them as they wait on the sidewalk in front of the bar.

But it means nothing to Kate as she stands, edgy, foot tapping in annoyance at the delay.

She should be with Castle. She_ wants _ to be with Castle...she wants to take him home and finish what they started because it's boiling through her veins, bubbling under the surface like molten lava...she's ready to erupt.

"Ugh..." Kate tosses the cup into the trash and turns back to her Captain, Esposito at her side.

"Quite a show you put on Detective Beckett..." Gates raises an eyebrow.

"Just following orders, Sir." Kate replies, her eyes still glued to the coffee cup, and she can't explain why, but something about it keeps pulling her back.

But of course she can explain it, it's Castle, she wants to be with Castle.

Her eyes flick to the ambulance down the street and Kate can just about make out Ryan standing outside it.

Where she should be.

"I don't remember my orders being quite so..." Gates, tilts her head, "Vivid?"

"You asked for a distraction," Kate re-folds her arms in front of her chest, ignoring the goosebumps rising in the night air, "We gave you one."

Esposito huffs next to her, coughs and turns away, his eyes dancing, lips battling not to smirk and make it worse.

Gates purses her lips, lets out a harsh breath and narrows her eyes, "I do not remember asking for..."

"You said we showed initiative when I called for shots." Kate reminds her, "We had to get him away from the front door. We did what we had to do."

What she really wants to do all over again, somewhere far more private.

Gates smirks, "You expect me to believe you knew you had back up coming that fast and that _that_," She waves her arm, "little _display_ was all a show?"

"I trust my team to _always_ have my back." Kate growls, holding in the urge to bark out a laugh bitterly, _all a show_, no fucking way...it was more like foreplay and the damn Captain is on the verge of denying her the main event. Her eyes can't seem to stay still, darting between the irate Gates and the ambulance that holds Castle.

She needs to be there with him.

"Ryan got a message to Castle." Kate explains, not twisting the truth but maybe angling it into a more flattering light.

"Esposito?" Gates bites out, seeking confirmation and making the man flinch at the sound of his name.

"We knew Vince was delayed." Espo nods, "When Beckett was playing pool with Logan, Castle was at the bar. I got a message to Ryan, Ryan passed it to Castle, got him to pass it over to Beckett.".

"Which was?" Gates folds her arms, leaning back on one foot, a slow steady blink sweeping her eyes as she takes in Esposito's explanation, digesting it savagely.

"Keep him busy." Espo shrugs honestly.

"And we did as you instructed," Beckett growls, dragging her hand through her hair again, because they did as instructed and _then some_, touching, teasing...feeling, grasping...groping. She clears her throat and turns back to find the Captains expectant eyes waiting for her.

"Do you know how he made you Beckett?" Gates asks her voice pitching low.

Kate opens her mouth, closes it again, battling with how exactly she's supposed to confess Castle touching her made her lose control, made her slip and say his name loud enough for Logan to hear.

"Logan said it himself." Espo pipes up, and she could hug him, buy him a beer, put in a good word with Lanie, whatever the hell he wants.

And Kate nods in agreement, watching as Gates looks between the two of them not convinced, "He recognised us, more specifically me," Kate cringes inwardly as she remembers his comments, his observations of her and Castle, "said he'd seen us in the papers." She folds and unfolds her arms and she really has had enough of this, Kate drags a hand through her hair again, and she just wants to leave.

The Captain looks like she's about to launch into another speech or a lecture, Kate clenches her fists waiting as the woman's eyes drop to the ground in that deadly way she has before she levels you with a stare and pulls you to pieces. Only before her mouth opens she catches sight of Kate's legs.

"Beckett you're bleeding." Gates points down at the raw and scraped skin of Kate's knees. Kate looks down, tracks the thin lines of red that are dripping down her shins, evidence of her fear for Castle's life. The tender skin shredded when she threw herself to her knees in the street, grateful to find him alive.

The Captain breathes out deeply, "Go get it taken care of." She points to the ambulance, and she can't be serious, Kate can't believe her ears...she's actually sending her where she wants to be. "And when you're done, get him out of here too."

She doesn't need to be told twice and ignoring the smirk that breaks freely across Esposito's face she strides away.

"I want the paperwork on my desk first thing tomorrow Detective Beckett." Gates yells as she moves further away, her feet almost skipping in anticipation. "And an explanation for what the hell he thought he was doing, tackling my suspect!"

"Yes Sir." She calls. And Gates can have whatever the fuck she wants _tomorrow_...tonight there is only one thing Kate wants.

* * *

><p>"I need to borrow your keys." Kate's eyes lift as she draws level with the ambulance and Ryan, holding out her hand.<p>

"What are you doing Beckett?" Ryan breathes, his eyes widening as he fishes through his pockets.

"My job." Kate states fiercely, palming the keys he offers as she turns her back on her Captain, and her team, now she can, desperately needing to see Castle, "I'm taking my partner home."


	24. Chapter Twenty Three

**Disclaimer: I own nothing and no one...but...sneak peaks... 0.0 **

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Twenty Three.<strong>

* * *

><p>Kate turns, her tender eyes bright sparks in the flickering light of nearby police cars as she watches Ryan draw level with Esposito. The two men turn as one, throwing a knowing gaze in her direction and her entire body pivots on the spot.<p>

Magnetized by the ambulance and the call of the man within. Kate shakes her head with each thudding footstep, and she can't pull away...not that she wants to.

In fact she clamours to slow her heart rate down, to stop herself from bounding through those last three or four footsteps just to get to him all that much quicker.

She said_ later_...she meant it at the time, when her blood was boiling, rushing in her veins and zinging through her ears, when his hands on her body were the only things she could think about and the darkness of his eyes drew her in and swallowed her whole.

And now, as she stands, her hand reaching for the door, Kate feels it all wash over her again.

Her heart is pounding, rapid rhythm through her chest, her face hot as thoughts of Castle heat her blood, and her fists clench painfully. Kate forces her fingers to release, feels the mild tremor run down the length of each digit before one hand closes over the cold metal of the door.

The other flutters across her face, pressing at her lips as she teeters on the brink of a life altering decision.

* * *

><p>Castle curls his fist, the ache raw and pressing at the hastily wrapped bandage, not comfortable again, the EMTs never get it right, but it's his fault this time because he couldn't keep still.<p>

His mind is racing a mile a minute, his body still popping with adrenaline from the fight. Before that the alley, before the alley the bike and before the bike...everything. The last two days have been the ultimate amalgamation of every fantasy scenario he has ever let play out in the recesses of his imagination. The pain of his bruised knuckles, seeping in around the edges, brings it all to life, vividly unbelievably real.

And yet under all that...elementally fused to his soul, his heart...is his longing for Kate.

The soft hot press of her body against his, the naked honesty in her eyes, the quiver and shake of her voice when he touched her.

All of it.

Every unknowable ounce of Kate Beckett will stay with him for eternity.

And he's sick to death of the fucking charade.

He wants her, and now he knows without a doubt that she wants him too, he just needs to see her, wash the guilt from her eyes and the doubt from her heart with the truth of their touch.

Because as good as she is undercover - and she's fucking brilliant - no matter what she told Logan and Gates, even Ryan and Esposito, in fact no matter what she tells herself, Castle knows with every fibre of his being...it _wasn't_ an act.

* * *

><p>Kate's fingers touch tentatively at her mouth as she hangs on the door, the bruise of previous kisses tangible under her fingertips. The sweep of his tongue vivid across her skin.<p>

Their slow treacherous dance. Wood hard under her thighs, and whenever she looks at him now she will feel the cold press of brick against her back and leather squeezed tight in her hands.

All of it lingers just under the surface and she needs to see him...

_Make it real._

Her mind and body had_ screamed_ at her to get on with it, give in to it, to him, to everything she knew they could be. The intensity of his touch over the cotton of her clothes, his mouth on her stomach, his hand on her breast, thumb over her nipple and the beautifully artistic swipe of his fingers between her legs.

Everything...

Everything coming to life in the dripping heat of her arousal, her lust and desire, her love... for him.

And it's more than enough for her to know that when he actually touches her, naked skin to naked skin, chest to chest, thighs aligned and perfect...properly touches her, lifting her high over him before pulling her down slowly, permeating her skin, invading her body, loving her ... the fire that lingers, lapping and licking with every tentative touch, will _engulf_ them.

Consume them both, and there would be no turning back...ever.

Kate's mind stutters, faltering around the images she creates as she confronts the certainty, buried deep and newly awakened...she _wants _ to_ burn_.

Kate wants the raging fire and the ferocious need to encompass her entire body as she wraps her legs around his waist for the third time and finally gets what she wants.

_Castle._

Sucking her bottom lip into her mouth Kate bites down, hard pressure to make her blink before she releases it and swallows. She lets the breath leave her chest slowly and she smiles, feeling dizzy and lightheaded with relief.

It comes at her in slow steady waves, much like the man himself, undeniable...inevitable. The honesty of their _act_ settles over her and swallows her whole.

Because she's not on the brink of a major decision, she doesn't have to choose to dive in and claim Castle. Her heart, still tearing at her ribs with frantic pounding beats tells her the truth of all she needs to know.

She's already made her choice, tonight is just case and point...the final straw, and all too easily, beautifully she finds herself in freefall from already leaping, a downward descent straight into his arms and the smile widens, her cheeks rising.

Lifting her foot to the step, Kate breathes harshly as she prepares to open the door.

* * *

><p>Castle's head snaps up the moment he hears her voice on the other side of the door, and though he had been expecting Ryan or the EMT, his ears prick up at the sound of her.<p>

_Kate_, her tone soft but determined, and he can't make out anything she says but the lilt of her speech lifts his heart, splits it wide open and lets the love inside pour forth like a volcanic eruption...heating his blood, thudding hard and fierce as it pulses through his chest, behind his eyes, his groin.

Just her voice...her_ voice._

And he stands.

His hand closes over the handle and he moves to shove it open, just as it swings wildly away from him and she's hoisting herself up into the ambulance. Not realising he's part way out the door, and just like that he finds himself standing face to face with Kate.

* * *

><p>"Hey," She breathes, as Castle drops back a step, staring at her strangely before she comes to rest in front of him. "How's the hand?" She quirks her eyebrow, smiles softly, and his ferocity dims as if the light of her eyes, her smile, is smudging the edges.<p>

Castle snorts, lifts it in front of him, waves it a little, "It's fine."

"The lip? Your eye?" Kate's fingers lift, hand reaching tentatively as if she's about to touch him but the blast of a siren behind her makes her jump, her hand falling again to rest on the skin of her thigh.

It lands with a harsh slap of skin on skin, Kate's heavy sigh following the sounds and on impulse she spins, catches the handle and pulls the door closed, hard behind her.

He steps back, eyes narrowing as his knees collide with something and Castle drops down into his seat. "It's all fine, lip hurts a bit, not going to be fun to talk." He pouts, touching at the tender skin, the thin line of the split that will heal quicker the longer he stays quiet..

"You mean...you might have to suffer in_ silence_?" Kate asks sarcastically, sinking down opposite him and smirking as she waits for Castle to look up.

"It's_ me_ we're talking about." He raises an eyebrow, and the playful tease he uses cautiously to ease them through this is wiped off his face as he winces. "Though I think I'm _suffering_ from Deja Vu."

Kate's smile drops a little and she leans towards Castle, eyes bright with concern. Her fingers flit over his scalp without touching before she gives in, "Maybe you hit your head?" Her hand brushes the hair from his forehead, seeking an injury that might have been missed, her thumb skimming the thin split in his eyebrow, as she inspects his face.

He huffs very nearly rolling his eyes, but leaning into her gentle touch,"No, I'm fine. I just mean this." He holds his hand up again, "Been there, done that," He lifts his head, finds her eyes and smiles, "got a hot detective to re-wrap the bloody bandages."

Her hands leave his face, sliding one finger down his jaw, before she moves to his injured hand and Kate snags it between her own, "Do you need me to...?"

Her fingers skim his, interlacing, soft over the bruised knuckles and she cautiously presses  
>at the edge of the thin strips of gauze that weave around his palm.<p>

Castle doesn't want her to pull away again, her hands holding his, cradling his wound softly as her fingers sweep back and forth. But he knows as soon as he shakes his head, telling her she doesn't need to this time, she will slide away.

Put distance between them once again.

Castle sighs, closes his eyes and breathes deeply, "It's ok."

And her hands slide away from his just as he expected.

Only Kate doesn't pull back, instead her hands lift and sweep across his face. Her fingertips touch lightly at the split in his lip, knuckles grazing his jaw and her thumb...so soft when it skirts the bruised skin of his eye that he can't bring himself to lift his lids and look at her.

What if it's all in his head?

Could his imagination be so cruel as to conjure this on top of everything else?

Because the case is over, yet she's here and touching him of her volition.

"_It's_ ok...but are you ?" Kate breathes quietly, and his eyes pop open wide, because her hot moist exhale is breaking across his lips, telling him she's close.

His fist clenches painfully at his side at the feel of her fingers, brushing down his arm and as if sensing his distress, Kate's hand hovers over his bandage, gently at the knuckles before she circles back around, grabbing a fistful of his leather jacket.

The material is hot and heavy and grounding in her hands, her head lifting up to find his eyes, heated pools of rich blue that smoulder slowly as she watches him.

Her thumb slides across his cheekbone, fingers brushing his ears and Castle is once again shocked by the raw emotion in her eyes.

Her lips quiver, cheeks flushing and her lashes flutter madly before she opens herself to him. And whatever dam was cracking slowly before, bursts wide in a great shuddering gush of emotion and Kate feels herself climbing into his lap.

Her mouth opens over his and he hisses when their lips connect, her hot wet tongue trailing over the split in his lip and it hurts in the best possible way. Heaven and hell in that simple touch.

"Shit." Her hand lands on his jaw and gentles his face, forehead tipping down to press into his, "I'm sorry Castle." Her fingers seek to soothe, unnecessarily, the pain he cherishes with the crush of her lips against his own.

Then she's shoving him away and leaning back enough to meet his eyes, anger burning there brightly, "No I'm not...you're an idiot. You_ threw _yourself in front of a suspect."

She shakes her head in disbelief, his hands drifting from her shoulders to settle over her wrists, and he can see so clearly how much Kate is still punishing herself.

Her hands fist in his jacket unable to let go but her eyes shine with pain and worry of what might have been. "I thought he _shot _ you." She says, her voice quiet, full of determination and barely concealed rage, her eyes roving his face. "Don't do that again Castle, not over some stupid undercover act."

Castle growls, losing all ability to stay calm and hold back because if she's going to start denying them again, if she's about to breathe across his lips another bare faced lie then...then he will prove to her how very wrong, and stupid and stubborn she really is.

His hand fists in her hair, tight and possessive, shock bursting through her lips as she gasps, his eyes instantaneously feral and all consuming. "You can't tell me that wasn't real." He snarls, his tongue darting out to lathe the line of her open mouth, tracing the wet seam of her panting lips watching as she blinks back at him in awe.

"You can't tell me," He breathes again, fire into her mouth, blistering over her tongue as it coils it's way into the pit of her stomach, and she shivers, "That _that_ wasn't_ real. _" His hand curves, selfish in it's need to feel her, sliding around her waist until he finds the hem of her shirt and thrusts it aside.

His hot palm over her ribs, moves high, cradles her spine, chases the underwire of her bra until, just like earlier, and never and always, he finds her, touches, teases, pokes and pesters until he's driving her crazy.

She rocks in his lap unable to stay still under the stimulation, awash with a new sense of urgency.

He thumbs aside the edge of her bra just enough that he can slip his finger underneath the hot damp lace and graze over her nipple, "Like this isn't real?" He challenges, when her knees either side of his waist squeeze painfully and she rocks into him, lifting up before she thuds heavily down into his lap.

Her pupils blaze above him, smouldering, the jet black pools drip with ravenous hunger, somehow darkening with each incessant swipe over the quivering bud of her nipple.

Kate doesn't care that she's straddling him in the back of an ambulance, the forgotten scrapes on her knees weeping into the sheet either side of his hips, because she hovers over his beautiful deadly mouth, and all she wants to do...all she has wanted to do for a very long time is lose herself in him.

"That's...that's _not_ what...I meant." She gasps against his waiting lips as another finger finds its way under her bra. Pinching and rolling and Kate finds herself falling into him again, stunning him as she dives into heated battle with his mouth and body, neither one able to contain the other.

No one winning, just rising and falling, pushing and pulling, an ebb and flow of give and take, hiss and moan, until both can barely breathe. Her heart colliding with his, the ricochet of devotion and passion, certainty and wonder splintering out and spilling into the spaces around them.

"What did you mean?" He pants when he pulls back, just enough to see the molten, liquid lava of desire changing the colour of her pupils before his very eyes. Castle marvels at the woman in his arms, her heavy sigh and the way she lingers over his mouth as if she misses his kiss already.

"Let's get out of here," She breathes heavily, shaking her head slowly lifting her fingers and pressing at his bottom lip before she leans back, yet she is unable to move away far enough to listen to her own advice.

"You taking me home Beckett?" Castle asks, the slow wicked grin gracing his lips. Sexy, masculine, deepening darkly at his own suggestion, his fingers still tangling in her hair, brushing over her skin, he cannot stop his movement, or find the sheer superhuman force of will it's going to take to stop touching her. Hope and want and need and everything all at once, floating behind the words as he waits.

Kate coils herself back into his body, her hands drift down the centre of his chest. Pulling away just a second before she would have touched his belt and she presses herself into his curving, seeking hand, not wanting him to let go.

"No...you're taking _me _ home," Her lashes flutter wildly then as his eyes dart open, huge and unbelieving in the dark shadows of the ambulance. Her hand slipping into her back pocket before re-emerging and her smile bursts to life, brilliant and intense between them.

"But I'm driving," she purrs, holding Ryan's keys in her hand, curling her wrist and letting the key chain dangle from one finger, Kate leans forwards and pressing her lips to his she asks the stupidest question, with the most obvious answer...

"You coming Castle?"


	25. Chapter Twenty Four

**Twenty Four.**

* * *

><p>Her keys barely make it into the lock the other side of the door before her mouth is sliding over his. The darkness of her apartment thrown off rapidly as she slams on the lights, eager to see him, have him see her. And her hands are hot and forceful either side of his face as she all but drags him into her home.<p>

No, screw that, she does drag him, pulling, tugging, yanking him with her as she walks backwards. Keeping them connected with a near death grip to his ears. Mouths locking, fusing...tasting.

He tastes like certainty and _yes please now_...

Like heat and fire and Kate begs at her mind to just shut up and enjoy it.

The stuttering trace of his tongue across her lower lip is all it takes to ensnare her. She gives in with a sweeping roll of her hips and shoulders, that lift her into him like a wave. Surging together, every inch of her body undulates against him, closing in on him before she's in retreat...she's hardly withdrawn to suck in a breath when she's diving back for more.

The feelings racing through her override everything else, the world at large suppressing itself when she caves into his chest, drawn in by his touch and taste...his smell when she inhales deeply against his skin, never breaking the connection...the bond of their lips.

Too good, too warm and perfect.

He presses between her thighs as they walk backwards, step after palpitating step, their bodies tangling, falling into perfect alignment. Legs and arms and tongues wrapping and weaving, until they are one quivering mish-mash of joining flesh.

Perfect motion as they move together.

Kate's hands slide through his hair, silk against her skin, her nails catching the muscle of his neck before her moan is reverberating against his lips and around his open mouth. She takes and tastes, deviant need so strong, like nothing before, like nothing tonight, maybe like nothing again.

Because if this is how they come together every time, and her mouth swallowing down his groan tells her it will be, how will they ever survive it?

How will they ever do anything _but _ this?

If this is before and pleasure, true _honest _ open pleasure comes later, how will she ever do anything but spend the rest of eternity in his bed? His arms?

She smiles around his lips, who the fuck cares? They are so good at it already, if this is her eternity...it might as well start now!

Every brush of his tongue steals the breath she hasn't taken yet, her heart exploding, frantic, hammering and harsh, intense and exquisite. A thesaurus of words running through her head, pounding loudly when he clutches at her tight, letting her know he feels exactly the same.

Then words and sounds and everything falls away, steadily replaced by the movement of his fingers.

* * *

><p>Castle's thumbs both glance across her cheekbones, his nose pressing into the smooth skin of her face as he inhales...inhales again, not letting any of the breath escape as he absorbs her, and his eyes squeeze shut tighter. The scent of Kate floods his system with an ecstatic sense of freedom, indulgence, <em>privilege<em> ...

He still can't believe he's here doing this with her. That he gets to be the one to see her this exposed and wanton, delicious...Except, his eyes are still clamping tight together enjoying the feel of her body, so he isn't really _seeing _ her, and he wants to so badly.

Forcing his eyes open, he breaks them apart, his lips wet and aching at the loss of her kiss, panting as his forehead falls against hers, holding her to him. "Kate, do you have a first aid kit?

She pulls back and stares at him quizzically, eyes wide with shock, lips quirking, "How_ rough _ do you think this is going to get Castle?"

She's close enough to feel the rumble of laughter bubble up through his chest, but it never makes it past his lips because the spark of mirth, the way she baits him, awakens something dark and needy and he crashes back down over her.

Unforgiving in his quest to devour her.

Because she's funny and wonderful and just...all the things he ever imagined she would be...but so much more, and teasing him in the midst of a kiss that is leading them nowhere but her bed.

Or her couch, shower, kitchen counter, the floor, somewhere, anywhere _now._

Beautiful, scarily hot, intelligent Beckett. Loving, kind, compassionate Kate and she's pulling at him, tugging him even as he steers her towards a destination he has no idea of, a room he's never been in before and that's wrong because she's hurt.

She skipped treatment at the ambulance somehow convincing or ignoring or maybe she just gave someone that look and they let it go, her tenacity too much a force to be reckoned with so they didn't even try.

But he will try, and he will succeed, even if it means taking charge and dominating their kiss just a little bit.

Castle licks at her bottom lip, remembering her reactions to it, knows she likes it already, and he moves his hot heavy tongue in thick swirling motion over the wet dry line of her mouth.

She clings to him tighter, desirable but not the desired effect...well yes...no no...he mumbles against her lip, calling her a tease, a magician, a wonder...something, he has no idea.

Oh.

He really, truly has no idea.

She told him he wouldn't...god she was_ not _ wrong!

No idea. Not one single teenie tiny clue. Her hands move and she palms the front of his jeans as her fingers start to toy with his belt and, damn her, she's winning again.

He changes tactic and bombards her with sensation, hands roaming, lips moving, tongue and skin and breath all claiming her in infinitesimal amounts. And before she even realises, he holds absolutely everything.

And he doesn't stop, walking her backwards, his bandaged hand soft against her face, thumb and fingers tracing the heat of her flushing cheek, whilst the other ripples down her side, cupping her waist before lifting her top.

Kate's skin is still damp under his hand as it splays wide, thumb over her hip until he is caressing the small of her back, fingers tripping over the vertebrae of her spine. In and out of the bony protrusions and plump, tight muscle, surging against her, rolling in rhythm and hearing her groan with each press of his fingers.

Massage...later there will definitely be a massage...if she makes noises like this just from the firm and devoted rotation of his fingers, yes...massage. Kate's body naked and spread out beneath him, his hands opening wide to cover the length of her back, her ass and the backs of her legs.

Trailing high, sweeping low, sliding under...dipping _in_.

But now...

"First. Aid. Kit.?" He asks pointedly, stopping their movement in the middle of her living room, pulling his lips away from hers, nudging against her face with the tip of his nose, her mouth still moving over his jaw.

* * *

><p>More kisses.<p>

_More _ kisses, she wants them, craves them, and when he doesn't immediately and willingly give them up, she takes them from him. Lips moving over his pulse, his jaw, kneading the skin just shy of his bottom lip and the edge of his mouth.

She has to have him, has to...and there is nothing holding her back anymore, nothing...nope...not one thing...

His hands squeeze, forceful and hard and perfect, but not what she wants because he's keeping her at arms length, cold air slipping between the burning heat of their joining bodies.

Kate pauses, sucks in a breath and looks up. He holds her gaze with unfaltering self assurance, rebellious, persistent and Kate knows that look...he's not backing down.

"Mmm? Bathroom." Kate grumbles, he's not getting away with this for much longer. But she gives in again, not caring if it means his mouth will stop wasting time with words and collide with hers.

It's almost startling, how she has never wanted anything quite so much as she wants his mouth...on her.

Anywhere..._everywhere._

Kate parts her lips, moving to take him in again, feeling like steam is rising and hissing from the achingly empty hollow. She's on fire with it, but just as her lips hover over his, so close to getting what she wants, Castle stills her movement.

Her eyes slam shut, her mouth open, soft pink skin reflecting the light, against his waiting lips and she feels them move when he speaks.

"Where?" The word leaves his mouth dark and oppressive, adhering like syrup to her tongue when he breaths, sticky and cloying against her skin.

Kate lets her hands drape around his neck, her head falling into the curve of his throat, trying to catch her breath against his chest.

He's stubborn, she knew that, she can see evidence of it everyday in his ability to stand by her side, but she has never truly appreciated how controlled he is. He can put her first and hold himself back, and that just...does something to her insides.

Melts her, scalds her, leaves her focusing on just_ how_ and_ where_ he's going to hold himself back from her next. Kate lifts away from his chest aching, always aching at the loss of contact, but she finds his eyes and lets him see, in whatever way she can, she knows exactly how good it's going to be.

That she can't wait for it any longer.

But she will, for him.

He has rules?

She_ loves _that he has rules, has focus when she doesn't, one or other of them will keep the path clear, their destination never wavering as they take turns giving in or taking charge.

Partners in pulsation, in practise, in touch and delirium.

Tingling in anticipation, Kate moulds herself around his body, her weight falling into his waiting hands as she cups his face. Just a second of quiet in the rip roaring heat before she presses her forehead to his cheek, kisses the edge of his mouth and growls reaching for his hand. Tugging him after her as they cross the apartment heading for her bathroom.

She will do it his way _now _ if it means she gets it her way_ soon._

* * *

><p>Kate doesn't register what he does to the cuts on her legs as she sits on the cold counter, shorts pulling tight, the denim riding high against her hips. But the icy cloth over her knee stings for a second before she's lost in him, the brush of leather when he moves.<p>

Pain be damned.

The feel of his fingers over her calf as he steadily unzips her boot and draws it from her foot has her pressing her lips together to keep from moaning. He guides her heel to rest across his thigh, stepping in closer and forcing Kate to bend her knee, angle her leg just a little more.

Kate arches her back, humming when her bare shoulders find the cool glass. His large bandage covered hand sliding against her thigh, touches her sensitive skin, curving around the back of her knee to hold her still. The other, just the tiniest bit less dextrous, drops the cloth back into the sink, squeezes out the water and washes away the blood and dirt.

Kate watches the wrinkles of concern given life and expand across his brow, seeping into his skin, and realises she must have winced or hissed, something because he suddenly starts to be even more gentle, more tender than he is already being.

If it's possible to come apart, heart and soul cracking wide, whilst balanced on the sink in your bathroom, she does. White hot waves in evidence of the force of his love catch her unawares, leave her swaying, tipping back towards the mirror.

He switched hands, trading one with the other to stop the dressing getting wet. But it keeps brushing against her skin, awakening her flesh to his healing touch...fuck she's seriously getting aroused by his bandaged hand and she would huff and roll her eyes...the old Kate would probably shove him away.

But no more.

All Kate can think about is unwrapping it, setting his fingers free and pulling his knuckles to her lips, pressing the balm of her grateful kisses to his skin...before she unwraps the rest of him.

She focuses on his face as her body vibrates. The heavenly curl of his tongue over his lip when he concentrates. The muscles of his jaw working hard and tighter than she likes, telling her he's holding back, restraining himself this time for fear of hurting her.

Kate wants to kiss away the worry and the trepidation, her hand steady as she imagines undoing the binding and letting her mouth rest hot and open on the juicy meat of his palm.

Kissing the pulse at his wrist...soft skin at the crease of his elbow, his bicep...her eyes drift to the expanse of his waiting neck, visible now his shirt has loosened... her tongue doused with anguish, she yearns to taste it. She rolls the throbbing muscle inside her own mouth, hot saliva rushing around it, heating her lips.

Her fingers find the jacket again, soft and supple, almost too much but so good and she holds onto it. Kate lets her fingers drift over the stitching, running the seams, up and down his arms unable to stay still.

Her head drops down, almost touching his chest as she holds herself back from the overwhelming urge to just...jump him.

Something soft presses hard against her knee, sore but oh...it feels good too, "There." He says quietly, pride in his voice and his open palms running along the back of her calf before he looks up. "All better, sorry if I..."

Kate's head snaps up, both hands grabbing at fistfuls of his jacket, his shirt, his skin. Anything they can reach to pull him closer.

She doesn't hide behind a kiss this time, her legs winding around his waist as she hoists herself up against him, wrapping around him, making him catch her. Instead, she holds him firm, her hands either side of his face so she can look into his eyes and breathe her intent across his lips.

"Now!"

He quakes, her arms surrounding him, his lifting her "Bed..."

She shakes her head, and he freezes, his eyes dropping low to find hers, confusion and desperation mixing through with a myriad of expressions that scream the same thing... _please don't run away._

She can't...she won't. No more running, no more hiding, but she needs to be _Kate_ when they do this. When they are intimate for the first time without prying eyes, without cops and criminals, bikes and barmen, fully and wholly herself when she lets him break through the last barrier that separates them. She has to be herself and not the leftover traces of whoever she was pretending to be tonight, this week,_ too long._

The truth of _everything_ will spill free in the one place she allows herself to give in, break down and rebuild.

Be whole again.

The place where she luxuriates in the feel of her own skin, warm and smooth under her hands, the sensation of water, lapping and licking, burning.

Everything hot.

She needs Castle like no other to help her wash it all away. Remove the dirt and the grime, the smell of smoke that stains her skin, the burn of Logan's eyes as they touched...she wants it all gone. So they can come together, finally, properly...just them.

"Shower." She answers simply, and in stunned disbelief he blinks, before his mouth descends again.


	26. Chapter Twenty Five

**Disclaimer**: I own nothing and no one but we are in the single digit countdown...bye bye sanity, hello Caskett heaven!

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><p><strong>Chapter Twenty Five.<strong>

_She's gotta hold of me and ain't letting go._

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><p>She can't be serious?<p>

Fantasy...

She's a total _fantasy_, and when he pulls back, his hand smooths a path down her hair, holding the back of her head. His lashes beating in time with his pounding heart and he has to check. "You want to...do this in the shower?" He asks it skeptically, he's not saying no, but his hand and her knees...this could end painfully, or...be a really funny story.

His fingers linger over her ears, moving in slow circles against the lobe, caressing her jaw until his little finger is teasing a path across her lower lip. Her eyes lift to his, heavy lids parting to let him glimpse the swirl of excitement, expectation and desire that darkens her iris, sends the blood rushing to her lips and cheeks.

Castle breathes, heavier than a sigh but lighter than a moan, her name chasing the end of the exhale when it washes over her skin, sending the flush into a tailspin. Darker red bursts like flames, deep crimson sparks over her cheekbones and he presses his lips to one, then the other. They have enough time ahead of them for stories.

This should be..._will _ be, an experience.

Life changing...a culmination of years of love and waiting...of long nights of tease and waiting and...did he mention waiting? It shouldn't be the rushed slip slide of...oh hell if she wants sex in the shower who is he kidding? He's in.

She huffs against his skin, hot and laughing or hot and annoyed, he's not sure, but hot...definitely hot, and she shakes her head. "I feel gross." Her mouth lifts just a little, amused at herself maybe and Castle tugs her into him hard, denial strong and firm on his tongue when it darts between her lips chasing away her statement.

She's gorgeous...she's...magnificent...deluded and completely insane. Devious...devious little minx, her hands spread over his chest to roam the straining muscle that holds her up and away from the floor. Tight over his heart, her nails skimming at his nipple through the thin black cotton.

They match, he realises suddenly, black shirt to black shirt, denim to denim, eager heart and hungry body meeting like and same and he presses her backwards, balancing her on the countertop so he can stand between her thighs.

He has no words, for all the things she is, the sheer newness of so many qualities taking him by surprise. So he kisses her instead, mouth opening hot and moist against hers, licking diagonally across her lips before she groans and unintentionally,_ deliberately_ grants him access.

Castle lets her read whatever she wants to about the way she looks, the way she feels, the beauty of how she tastes, into the way his lips move over hers.

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><p>Kate lets her hands drift to his waist, the belt weighs heavy for a second before she discards it and instead opts for skin, seeking out his chest and his abdomen, his arms, by slipping her fingers underneath his shirt.<p>

"I'm _so_ glad this case is over," Kate groans, dragging her mouth away from him so she can lower her leg, shift in his palms and slide down his body. Her bootless feet drop her down lower in front of him than he expects, the change in height thrilling through his chest.

It puts his lips at her forehead, hers to his jaw and Kate lifts against him, mouthing the bone scraping her teeth over him.

"I cannot _wait _ to get out of these clothes." Kate shudders genuinely at the skanky element, the lingering residue, that feels like it's ingraining itself in her skin. Kissing his face again before she freezes, his fingers making her desperate to get out of her clothes for a whole other reason.

His hand squeezes across the back of her thighs, moves higher, drawing patterns over the cotton that covers her stomach, before he flicks again and again at the hem of her shirt.

She gets the hint, drops a few of her own when she yanks him towards her by the thick collar of his leather jacket. She wants it off, plans to tell him so but his eyes spark, flecks of humorous torment, the look he gets before he says something that makes her want to throw things at his head.

And now pin him somewhere and kiss him senseless.

Castle looks her up and down, soft tease and an easy smile, something in the way she angles her jaw, purses her lips, daring him to be bold. "I don't know Kate, you look pretty hot to..."

She smiles, eyes crinkling mischievously, baiting him and getting in first.

And the words fall away as Kate grazes her hands over the length of her body to find the black hem, raising the tank top up slowly over her head, brushing her hair free before she drops the shirt to the floor at Castle's feet.

Standing in nothing but her black bra and denim shorts, Kate trails her hand down the centre of her chest, thumb over her breast bone, the small lace bow of her bra until she circles her navel.

Castle feels his mouth flood suddenly with burning hot saliva, his tongue throbbing to taste her again, where her thumb sits, the area he made his playground when he chased dancing liquid across it.

Kate leans forwards, catching hold of the leather of his jacket between her thumb and forefinger, supple and strong under her touch and she presses her nose into his collar, breathing deeply, "You're not so bad yourself Castle." Kate murmurs, her eyes creeping high, flashing with determination once again.

Standing on her toes to curl her hand around his neck, Kate pulls Castle forwards, demands he strips too. And when he's too lost in her, his hands heavy against her back once again, she slides her palms up his chest, rides them up over the rippling muscle in his shoulders and pushes the thick leather coat off of his arms.

Freeing him.

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><p>His black shirt is tight, her hands touch everywhere and make it tighter.<p>

Will it cling even more gloriously if she gets him wet?

Her eyes open wide, three rapid blinks as her fingers drag across his abdomen, everything rippling under her touch...she wants to get him wet...

In _every _ possible way.

She wants to drown him in her sweat and arousal, absorb him...suck him way down deep and never ever let him go.

But first she needs to get his shirt off.

And snag another kiss, why did they stop kissing?

Her eyes linger over the plump flesh of his lower lip, unconsciously dragging her own into her mouth, savouring skin, even if it's hers and not his, waiting for the soft parting of his lips when he breathes.

Kate touches the air that leaves his mouth, warm and laced with urgency as it blasts across the pads of her hovering fingers. He breathes again, each breath catching her fingers quicker than the last as his heart rate speeds up, his chest all but heaving, meeting hers in the steady rise and fall.

The barest touch across his lips and she feels him shiver, something primal, feral, _animalistic_ awakens within her, lifts it's head, target sighted. Kate looks up at him, rolls her neck and arches her back with feline grace, powerful, lithe and deadly. Her eyes narrow, focusing in on what she wants.

And then she gets it.

His mouth, her prey.

He breaks her apart with the words that spill from these talented lips, so she bites at the tender skin, sharp teeth pressing until he hisses, his fingers tightening at her hips. He lets her come undone with the teasing trace of his thick hot tongue...he devours, delights, demands, so she punishes him just a bit.

The slither of her tongue meeting his gasp when her fingernails graze across the straining denim resting at her inner thigh, squeezing him through the thick material.

Everything thick hard and heavy.

The dark denim, him, the blood through her veins pounding against the drums of her ears.

The basest of rhythms.

Castle's hands catch over the bare skin of her back, hot...so hot.

His palms so damp he has to drag them to keep them moving, no silky slide now, everything hot and moist with mutual sweat.

Better somehow, more real, true and honest. It's not perfect it's hot and sticky and damp and Kate reaches for him, not understanding how she has to do that because she still hasn't found it in her to let him go. But she moves, changes path, finds a shortcut and skips along it merrily, her hands clawing at his clothes.

Hoping her nails leave tracks across his chest that she can trace with her tongue when she has him naked.

She gets the suddenly annoyingly clingy material up around his armpits before she has to break apart from his mouth, shove him back enough to yank the shirt over his head and toss it behind him, before pulling him back in.

All within seconds, and she laughs into his mouth at the stunned look that flashes in his eyes, before he gives in to the call of her body...

Going with the roll and surge of unwavering movement that she creates.

And he falls into line...into_ love._

Kate growls her appreciation, her hands on his belt, pulling it free of the loops. Lips pressing together and not moving. They freeze midway through their kiss when her fingers brush the soft hair of his stomach and slide under the waistband, whilst the other hand drags down the zip.

Silence fills the room, invaded only by the sound of metal teeth separating and heaving panting breath. Kate waits, watching, her hands trembling but then _oh_...oh so steady.

Crossing another line together.

Kate smiles against the open curve of his lips, feels his mouth moving to copy hers, before he kicks off his shoes and his jeans are sliding down his legs.

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><p>When he stands before her naked, save for his boxers, and they are on more of an even footing skin wise - so much skin, beautiful warm skin and she wants to touch all of it -<p>

Kate starts to unwrap his hand.

Weaving and winding the binding of his fingers until she can see the grazes of his knuckles. The red welts across the joints that will lead to bruises, maybe scars. Probably not, she's being melodramatic, his presence clouding her mind.

But she hates the fact his skin is damaged because of her, because of him and his stupid loving loyal heart, and just as she imagined earlier, Kate lifts his hand, brings it to her lips, presses the knuckles each individually with her kiss before she drops the bandage to the floor.

Lifting her eyes she steps backwards, their fingers lacing briefly before she drops them too, lets them slide apart and turns for the shower.

Kate makes the water hot, no need for icy sprays and delaying gratification, but not so hot that either one of them will pass out. She thinks she might anyway, what with the way her skin is electrified, aware of his touch even as they stand apart...

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><p>Castle watches, his eyes wide, fingers clenching as the denim slips down her legs. A tiny puddle, barely more than a droplet of material, pooling at her feet.<p>

But his eyes don't linger there, they travel up the length of her perfectly curving limbs, over the calves previously hidden by her boots. He is sure her skin will still be warm from his fingers when he dressed her wounds, wants the tactility of touch as proof, a soft fondle, a hard grope...

Any of it, all of it.

The hot flesh from ravaged knee to the plump thigh he's had wrapped around him not that long ago.

Arriving at her chest just as the bra pops at her back and she undoes the clasp and slips it down her arms, black lace sliding to the end of her fingertips before that too is discarded on the floor.

The weight of her breasts causes them to bob with the freedom of being unrestricted, nipples pert and reaching, darkening pink, a shade he knows well. The same colour as the inside of her mouth when it catches the light, the soft blush to her cheeks when he runs his fingers over the quivering lips between her legs.

Castle steps forwards as Kate steps back, sliding open the door of her shower, her eyes never leave his as she steps in. Kate doesn't close the door behind her as she stands under the spray and with one last glance at Castle, she closes her eyes and washes away undercover Beckett.

The water, hot and steamy, floods the glass before his eyes, the coiled mass of her hair drenching and unfolding, giving in under the thundering spray until it loosens and falls heavier, thicker and longer down her back.

Tiny pinpricks of heat splash out around her, leaving the cubicle and hitting his legs. It's enough to keep him in the here and now, not collapsing on the floor in shock, or so utterly lost in fantasy he misses everything.

Thick white globs of shampoo slide down her back, his nose suddenly flooded with a familiar scent. The burning lingering trace of cherries, underscored with something sweet, musky and so ridiculously Kate that it meanders through his senses tugging at his flesh, lighting his skin, synapses of memory firing rapidly.

Her hands rub at her eyes, her lips, hooking her hair behind her ears before they converge over her chest, a shallow slide across her nipples that leaves her moaning and him straining through the thin cotton of his boxers, desperate to fling himself at her, unable to tear his eyes away from the mesmerizing image before him.

He can hear her sigh, watches the way both palms drop to the tile in front of her, Kate arches her back. The steam rising from her skin, water sliding over her spine in glittering flowing rivers, running to the valley between her cheeks, down her thighs.

So gloriously hot, he can feel the waves of fever shimmering over him as they leave the cubicle, nothing at all to do with the water. Kate turns, one hand pulling the hair away from her face, up and over her shoulder, so she can see him.

She steps to the very edge of the cubicle her eyes on him, dripping wet, water running down her body, falling to the floor, cascading across his feet as she extends her arms and reaches for him.

"Castle...you." She smiles, shaking her head, words failing her, "I want..."

And he's moving, his fingers sliding through her damp and pruning palm, their fingertips brushing, until she pulls him closer, breathing another_ 'you'_ across his lips.

Naked and wet in his arms, she entices his mouth to hers, kissing him slowly, surely, and in tender silence _Kate_ invites him to join her.

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><p>The water trickles, running in pounding heated rivers down her spine and his lips find the curve of her neck when she lifts into the spray.<p>

Somehow he seems to know instinctively what she needs, why she has to be in the shower before they fall into her bed, because his lips taste and press across her skin, but they don't seek anything other than closeness...for now.

It's more about touch, about knowing and finding her out. About the curve of her back when she arches under the hot water.

It's about the sensations when he watches her wash the grime from her hair, about learning as he lifts the sodden mass away from her back to let the water hit her shoulder blades, his fingers circling, hard and soft presses into her neck.

Kate lets her hands drift over his arms, getting to know the bulge of muscle under water. The broad width of his chest that has held her so securely these last few days, providing sanctuary she couldn't quite grasp.

And now she can.

Kate's fingers trail and trip over his collarbone, thumbing the pounding pulse of his jugular following the line of his throat until she rests at the centre of his chest. Her palm spreading wide to lay over his heart.

And his hand tracing the line of her spine, hovering over the swell of her hips is more about being than having, touching, than teasing.

But it's teasing nonetheless and he presses her back into the cold tile, hand wiping away the falling water at the centre of her chest, forging a path across her breast, deviating in his journey to lay over the plump quivering skin, rolling her nipple back and forth under the pad of his thumb before the curve of her stomach screams for his attention.

The skin he tasted only yesterday vibrating under his hands, but he sweeps past it, nails across her hip until he finds her hand.

Palm to the wall to keep a balance she has no hope of holding onto, he caresses the inner curve of her wrist, the thudding pulse under his fingertips, before he drags it up with his and presses it to the shower wall.

High above her head, the water tumbling along the now exposed length of her side, his other hand slipping into her clean hair and bringing her towards him, seeking her kiss, her lips, her heart, all with the slide of his mouth.

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><p>Her fingers glide over wet skin, water dripping, like she is, pooling in large hot droplets in the thin line of hair that starts at his navel and drops down. Kate follows it, her hand wedging its way between their touching, sliding bodies.<p>

Her nails graze his hip, his thigh, skims muscle that spasms against the palm of her  
>seeking hand until she grips him hard...her eyes flashing to find his in the falling spray.<p>

Darker than she has ever seen him, his eyes on hers, watching the reaction of her face as she touches him. Sapphire infused with fire, with flame and her hands sparking like flint with each brush along the hard length, before drifting around his waist.

Kate's hand trails his ass squeezing, roaming, moving down the backs of his thighs, climbing back up to repeat the motion and each time she holds him in her hand she squeezes just a little bit tighter, before he burrows into the curve of her shoulder panting hard.

Her name breaks across his lips in warning.

One she heeds, catching at his hand.

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><p>Stark whites, dark purples, a vivid brilliant blue that she clings to. A so not Kate Beckett pink that shocks him, especially when it smacks him in the chest, and even something that resembles a tiger print...a sheer abundance of towels.<p>

The tile of her bathroom floor cold under their feet.

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><p>Kate pushes him back, steps around him, brings him with her, their bodies bumping and colliding, eyes focusing, blurring as they move. Castle follows her lead, follows her when she pulls him into her bedroom, his hand at the small of her back when she falls into the mattress, taking him with her..<p>

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><p>The hot slice of his fingers as they part her lips, pads pressing as he divides her, explores...pushing into her in a way that makes her want to hiss and whimper all at the same time.<p>

She's not sure what he's doing, if he knows what he does to her, but the beautiful liquid blue of his eyes, focusing so intently upon her face and the feel of her every reaction...It's too much, and he's too close.

He can see everything, know the ache and quiver and intensity. Castle can_ feel_ it before she knows exactly what it means and Kate wants desperately to close her eyes.

But she can't...she won't...she doesn't...doesn't remember how to make her eyelids work, her chest rise...everything's so hot...too hot...too much. And Castle's firm fingers, touching her so perfectly it's...it's...

"Beautiful." He breathes, across her sodden skin, fingers walking, preoccupied in their own labour of love as Castle gives up his riveting examination of her face, lost in the bliss of his fingers, so his lips can trail her neck.

Kate arches back, his declaration all the encouragement she needs - not that she needs much- and uses her toes to raise herself from the bed, making his fingers chase the heated centre of her body.

Lifting her leg, she wraps it around his calf opening herself to him, her foot slipping on the sheets.

But he catches her, one hand to her waist, the other underneath and he shifts his palm, rotates his wrist and extends his index fingers...curling up...

Kate's teeth close over his shoulder as he holds her to him, and they aren't in the shower anymore and yet they are being smothered in a waterfall of lust, a raging torrent of desire, and all Kate can think about, aside from the way his fingers are joining together to...

"Ohh..." Her eyes open wider...all she can think about aside from the way he moves, is that she always thought in middle of sex, any chance he got to touch her infact, she assumed he would be more talkative.

But he's mapping the curves of her hip with his hand, cupping her cheek, her thigh, her ribs, then her breast. He's making tracks across her skin, learning, remembering, researching, and she can't help but tease him.

Her breath heavy, voice breaking in panting gasps around the words, "This...better not...end up...in a book."

His head snaps up from the curve of her throat, lips still parting from the kiss he was about to lay over her skin. His eyes darting from the line of her neck, to her lips, to her eyes, the thing trickle of water droplets that clings to her nipple calling his mouth so loudly his tongue feels thick against his lips.

Beautiful, unknowable, mysterious Kate, and yet she knows him..._knows_ him well enough to read his mind, even the dirtiest recesses he would keep to himself, because almost the second she spoke, he had been thinking it.

"_Wet heat_," Castle tells her, then tries to catch the words he moans aloud, his earlier fantasies so very real as his fingers find the weeping molten heart of her desire. But too late they emerge from his lips, startling Kate into a laugh, her fingers digging into his shoulders.

Kate's hand lands hard on his chest as she slaps him, growling at the way he flinches so perfectly inside her. "Don't you fucking dare." She warns him. "I will...shoot...you." The last word leaves her lips more of a sigh than a threat, Castle's invasion stealing her ability to be scary.

But the meaning is clear, she will exact some form of painful revenge if '_Wet Heat_' ever appears on a bookshelf.

Not that it will.

Ever.

"_Ours_." He growls fiercely. The sparks from her tongue igniting their kiss as he lets her know, whatever happens between them_ here_, whatever words she speaks, moans or screams...whatever silly things fall from his mouth in the deep dark peace of their time alone, will belong to _them_ and only them.

One word is enough, and his fingers curl again, teasing and dreamily wading through the plush sensitive skin she exposes willingly to him.

And, even as he gives her reassurances, he will take every one of her threats, because he plans to die a thousand deaths with her tonight anyway.

Each one more intense and vivid and lingering than the last, until they break in white hot flame and emerge like phoenix from the ashes, the smouldering remains of who they used to be decimated at their feet.

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><p><strong>AN:** It's not a tease, it's a promise, one chapter and the epilogue and I just couldn't physically fit it all into this one. That said thank you all so much for reading and encouraging, reviewing and yelling, but mostly making me laugh...a lot. Who knew the secret to joy was Caskett sex? .. oh yeah, everyone!


	27. Chapter Twenty Six

**Chapter Twenty Six**

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><p>Just before she breaks she thrusts him aside.<p>

Batting his hand away, her heart hammering so hard in her chest that it could beat straight through the wall of her ribs, a wrecking ball against his chest before it collides with his own, a glorious technicolour of explosion.

He looks down at her in shock, her forehead resting against his for a second before she's clambering backwards up the bed and bringing him with her. Arching against the pillows, drawing her legs up to give him space.

His hands skim over her skin, when he crawls towards her. The waiting length of her legs gliding under his palm until he finds the rise of her bent knees. His eyes trained on hers for the slightest hesitation, Castle presses at the line where her kneecaps touch.

Kate swallows, she has no resistance, has no yearning other than his caress and when his hot and heavy hand slides between her legs, his fingers just brushing the base of her thigh, a long breathy moan leaves her mouth.

He stares down at her, rising above on his knees, and spreads her legs wide with the intention to fall between them. Her hands lift reaching for him because she expects it too, but Castle finds himself struck with memories of fantasies in the alley...the long expanse of her creamy calf, the shadowed dip in her knee the delicious swell of her thigh.

All of it before him...and instead of falling into her, Castle drags himself upwards, watching the confusion in her eyes, the way she puzzles him out. Her eyes move over his naked body, hover over his mouth, her tongue darting to her lip before flitting away...she knows.

Even in bed she reads his mind, takes those few seconds to work him out...oh it's going to be so very magical between them...good and hot and...he runs his finger down the groove of her pelvis, the narrow line where hip meets thigh and she lifts away from the bed.

It's not an arch, it's barely a millimeters distance she puts between the mattress and herself before she's in control again. The narrowing slits of her eyes the only things that give her away.

Castle draws an invisible, searing line from hip to hip and gets another lift, he wants more though, letting his fingers come together chasing a bead of liquid across her stomach once again.

He presses hard as he circles her navel, hears her groan and knows she can feel it inside and out, before his thumb dips inside the waiting damp pool and his fingers drag across her flat stomach. Castle leans forwards chases the movement with his tongue, an ever widening sweep and Kate moans, catches it, bites down on her tongue as she traps the noise away.

His eyes scrunch tight, burning with anger or annoyance...something tangibly new...grievance that she is denying him things...denying herself something.

"Let me hear..." He beseeches, craving every little bit of her, lifting away to...

But her eyes open wide, lips parting, the noise escaping of her own free will as she calls to him, a long drawn out noise of _oh please yes now_ before she says, "Castle stop teasing me."

She begs...

Begs...demands berates and scolds all at the same time, her eyes rolling in her head as the lust seeps away, dying down to an agonized simmer that waits for him, and then she's back fierce and scary, smiling at him like a lioness sighting prey "You've done it for two days Castle..."

Her legs wrap around his waist, pulling him forwards, her hands chasing sensation up her own thighs, over her chest.

"Give. It. Up."

She's on her elbows, lifting, smiling, demanding, playing with him..._he's teased her for two days?_

Her position leaves her open...vulnerable, a line from hip to chest, navel to nipple open and clear and begging for his attention...much like she is. And it's shocking, bone shudderingly shocking that she's calling HIM the tease.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" He moans as he slides the hard length of his body along the smooth soft plains of her own. Forcing her down flat into the bed, her arms lift and curl around his shoulders "Undercover...shorts...pool table." He groans falling into the hollow of her neck so he can kiss her, "Alleyway." Lips dripping, "You...on that bike." Honey from his tongue, circling her ear, easing their way inside her.

She growls. "Body shot." Her eyes daring him to contradict her. Not what he expects, maybe exactly as he imagines and she reaches for him. "Leather jacket...Your fault."

Her ankles hitch and pull, her hips arching high and she contradicts her own words by reaching for him. Her steady hand closing around the solid thick length of...

"Oh god."

One hand squeezes his hip, nails suddenly harsh as she uses everything she has to pull him closer. The other keeps up the unending milking motion, her thumb repeating the harsh circles she started in the shower, waiting for his answering thrust.

Then she does it again and again, making him keep up the steady bucking motion, all the while drawing him nearer to her...closer to the edge.

He slides a hand around her waist, under her back, lifting her from the bed so he can take her with him, just...take her...

By surprise...

Her eyes flutter madly and her mouth falls open when she feels him nudging at the waiting wet haven of her body, the hard tip separating her lips agonisingly slowly, beautiful bruising force that holds her eyes open wide. His hands land either side of her head, before he pushes in, deliberate and deep.

Her fingers trail the length of him as he glides forwards, catches at his stomach as the solid length of his erection slips through her fingers and slides into her. Her mouth opening slowly against his lips, no words or sounds just breath to breath in awe and wonder.

Kate curves around his hip to his back, her hands skimming, roaming, taking, unable to keep still as he moves between her thighs, the heat of throbbing muscles...pounding, colliding so slowly...

Nails digging in, both of them freezing and locking, before liquefying under the intense heat, boiling, bubbling...

Her hands cradle his body close, hooking herself under his arms as he uses them for leverage, the thick muscle of his biceps tense with restraint. Taut and tight and oh...

He keeps moving, up and in, a never ending slide as he enters her, invading and parting the clingy spongy...madly quivering wet warmth, until she fully and completely surrounds him. One final drawn out arch of his back bringing their hips into perfect alignment, burying himself in the fathomless depths of her mind, soul and clenching body.

A long drawn out "Oooh," invades the silence of the room, neither sure if they make the sound or make the other.

Castle drops his head into the waiting cradle of her shoulder, breathing rapidly at the feel of Kate's hot wet body holding him in an intense tight grip. He feels the ripple of her muscles beneath his, around his as she quivers, nipples skimming his chest frantically as she struggles to breath.

He struggles with her, neither one of them will last long, the pent up, built up foreplay has kept them on a knifes edge for as long as they care to remember. And Castle can already feel the battle within Kate, waging war on her body as she gives in, tiny tremors that leave her clinging to his shaft. Her entire being ready to sucumb to the heavenly convulsions that flit just at edge of her vision, so very very close...

His head in the hollow of her neck lifts, finding her eyes, watching her fight the hard pull of her closing lids when he slides one hand along her chest at the same time he moves his hips, withdrawing from her as slowly as humanly possible.

Before he surrenders.

Knowing it's going to be fast and quick like their connecting minds, hard and dirty like the torment of their undercover mission...and Castle groans, her lips curving, a near sudden smile breaking bright as she rises to meet him and he slams back into her.

Hopeless abandon the only choice, no other option as rippling waves of mounting pleasure wash over them both.

Kate moulds her hands to the tensing muscles in his back, roaming skimming, dragging her nails, she feels him hiss, hisses back when he angles his hips in retaliation and starlight bursts bright behind her eyes for just a split second before he's pulling away again.

Dragging against her one way, pushing back inside, surging forwards.

Their hips constricting the movement as they cling, not willing to let go, unable to stay still all the while he pulls out pushes in and she lifts and falls, meeting each other, matching the tempo. Her hands slide up his back to his neck,cradling his head to find his lips, her mouth opening ripe and sweet and juicy...

All of her juicy as he slides into her deeply again, hitting skin and burning through muscles, liquid heat pooling around him, sodden and seeping, licking, lapping against the hard tense meaty pleasure.

He picks up speed, hears her breaking breath, her inability to comprehend, and he smothers it with his mouth, bathes it with his own loss of understanding...how can it be this good and still mounting...still building?

They rise together up and up and up.

Swirling in heat and hot moisture as Castle drags her hips into his, a hand to her back lifting her into him, and at the same time her hand falls to the bed, one hand on his shoulder to hold him firm as the other pushes her up.

They slam together again...and again...

Frantic, electrified and fast.

Their tongues in battle, eyes fusing once more, the atmosphere pressing at their skin, the tension of their bodies pulling them into thin ragged elastic strips, tight and tighter still as they rush towards the inevitable, waiting to snap...

Desperate for it.

Aching, arching and needing it. Needing each other, the brush and slip slide of skin, the pull...

The cry of each other names lost into the heat of their mouths, tongues dancing, lathing words of love and _yes yes yes_ against wet lips.

More.

More.

So much more...

And in a white hot blaze of dizzying,_ exquisitely_ painful pleasure Kate feels her orgasm, welling up, building up, reaching its pinnacle until it hits her, slams into her with full force and rips her apart from head to toe.

Bathed in flame, it claws its way free from her skin, in roll after roll of ecstatic bliss, her mouth and body so completely _full_ of Castle that the sound she makes shouldn't escape into the room, but it does.

The near scream of pounding pleasure, deafening him for the barest of seconds before she's writhing beneath him, forcing him deeper and harder, demanding more and more and more...

Tongue tied, astonished, enchanted by the reactions of her body...losing his own battle, his sanity slipping as the tight coil of his muscles takes control of his mind, blood draining, desire pooling.

And Kate, coming for him still, quaking in his arms as she falls apart, splintering, shattering. Exploding wide, wet and hot.

Bombarding his system with her whimpers and moans, the clawing grip of her muscles, the beautiful savage reaction of her body, all because of him, them together. And he gives into her instincts,her calls and demands for more...more...always more.

Unable to still his movement, not wanting to, he's lost in it, in her, in the rough quaver of her exalting cry against his tongue.

Until Kate gets what she wants again, still shuddering and at last pulling him with her.

They shoot high together as he explodes, the room flooded with starlight and waves of blistering tension, blissful cries and the unrelenting squeeze of her body keeping him in drastic, unknowing motion.

And yet he keeps going, spurt after spurt of white hot delirium, clench after clench of her body around his as she rolls and twists and devours his mouth, pulls his body into hers like she's never letting him go.

They break apart, split open wide and empty into each other repeatedly, liquid love, longing lacing with lust, rip roaring force that has them clinging to one another in desperation as they ride it to the very end.

With another stuttering slam of hip to hip, bone to bone and heart against palpitating heart, her ankles hook at his back, his arms give out and he falls into her waiting willing vibrating body, kissing her mouth, tasting and teasing her lips all the while.


	28. Epilogue

To Jenna for helping me start it. To Kat for the image that goes with it. To Lizzie for aiding my insanity!

I've said it before and I'll say it again, if you have read, reviewed, commented, pm'd, tweeted or yelled at me, Thank you! I will admit I'm a little sad it's finished.

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><p><strong>EPILOGUE<strong>

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><p>The soft echo of her voice, before it fades off, dances around his ears and Castle realises she isn't curled in the bed next to him where she should be. He spreads his hands across the mattress and realises she isn't even close enough for him to touch. He can hear her talking as he emerges from his sated dreamy state, a beautiful waking lullaby that flirts with his ears, caresses his mind.<p>

He sits up in the bed slowly, palms his eyes and sighs, letting his eyes adjust to the darkness and he finds her at the end of the bed. It's smaller than his, but he's in her bedroom in the pitch black of their first night together and anything from this point feels amazing...the fact the mattress is narrower just means he gets to be closer to her...When she's actually_ in_ the bed.

Light from the street filters in enough that he can tell Kate is still naked, liquid white merging with her skin as it trickles down the arch of her spine and pools in the dip of her hips. One leg drawn up under her chin, arms wrapping around it to stare down at something in her hand.

"Are you leaving?" He asks, sleep is marring the pain in his voice enough, he hopes, that he doesn't sound as desperate as he feels waiting for her answer.

Then he remembers where they are. Her home, not his

But she doesn't answer, "Gates called." she states instead, turning her head to face him, the disheveled blanket of her hair falling across one bare shoulder as she swivels. Her hand slides slowly over the lump of his foot that rest alongside her thigh, the closest part of him to her. Kate lets her fingers curl, the weight of her body titling into his leg, before she finds his eyes, pinpricks of luminosity in the darkness of her bedroom, "No Castle, I live here," She answers quietly, "are you?" Her voice is gentle, shy almost, as it drifts across the bed.

Though his mind is screaming at him to move with lightning speed, Castle sits up and slides slowly down the bed. His feet hit the wooden floor next to hers, sheets falling away from them and landing in a heap, and he moves as if frightened she'll startle. As if any movement too quick or intense will send her running, which is ridiculous because her voice and that tender look in her eyes are all but smacking him in the face with her yearning for him to ask her, beg her, demand that she stay in bed with him.

To tell her he won't leave.

But he doesn't need words.

Castle holds Kate's eyes, slipping his fingers through the tangled wreck of her curls, the corner of his mouth lifting slightly before he parts his lips and draws her in. His fingers stroke across her head, his thumb over the shell of her ear and his tongue parting the line of her lips with a forceful press.

Her mouth the ripest and sweetest thing he has ever tasted, smouldering embers igniting under his fingertips all over again.

Leave?

How could she _ever_ think he wants to leave?

Castle gets bolder, with her naked body so very close and his hand falls from her hair, trickles past her throat, fingers as heavy as the heated blood that he feels pounding beneath his palm, his desire as red as the blush to her skin.

She's going to have to have him forcibly removed.

He massages at the muscle in the back of her neck, feels her groan at the release of pressure and her hand slide up his naked thigh to rest low on his stomach.

Clenching and unclenching her fingers against his hot skin, Castle lets his hand drop again his thumb trailing her breast bone. Her lips wide and inviting him in with another hot bathe of her tongue that teases and quivers around his mouth before she gasps and his fingers connect with her breast.

Soft and warm, heavy weight in his palm, but he slips past her supple skin, ignoring her moan of reluctance, drawing her more firmly into his chest. Castle's hand runs the length of her back to rest at the base of her spine. Heated and demanding, firm and tender pressure as he holds her against him and lets the flush of reassurance wash over her.

Wash over them both.

Castle pulls back, his hand rising between them to slide across her lips, waiting with his fingers pressing at her mouth until he feels her smile under his touch. Her eyes open, blinking softly kissing at his hand before she sits back and smiles, "Should I take that as a no?"

"What did Gates want?" He asks quietly, not needing to acknowledge the obvious answer to her statement.

And she catches him off guard, looking very much like she wants to slap him across the chest, as she rolls her eyes, her head falling to rest against him, "No Gates in the bed ok?"

Castle huffs a laugh and nods slowly, but he still waits her out.

Kate lifts her head "Paperwork in the morning, debriefing...things..." She sighs, clearly not looking forward to it.

"You think she's ever gonna let me come undercover with you guys again?" Castle asks, his voice humming with concern.

"Would you want to?" Kate asks tilting her head, not really surprised, she knows him well enough by now to expect the exuberance, but maybe...needing to hear it from the man himself.

"Of course, it was fun." Kate opens her eyes widely, purses her lips, and he amends his answer fast, "Enlightening...interesting...Oh come on I got to grope you in an alley, ride your Harley annnd..." He smiles.

Kate scrunches her nose, drawing her knees up to her chest, blood rushing to her cheeks again before she smiles back, "Body shots."

Castle sighs gleefully and nods his head "Yeah that..." he looks her up and down, naked and pink and glowing in the soft non-light of her bedroom. Beautiful, vibrant and... "You know, I think the only way I'm tasting anything _ever_ again is by licking it off of your skin."

And this time she does thump him.

"You are _not_ going to be licking anything off of me in a strip club Castle thats..."

"Strip...club?" His eyes widen and then scrunch in confusion.

"I mean if you're really sure you want to go undercover again." Kate sighs, watching as Castle's eyes mist over his voice dreamy when he utters

"_Strip club_."

Visions of Kate sliding down a pole, upside down with her hair trailing the floor fill his head, gold glitter across her skin, skimpy see through underwear...nipple tassles...is he drooling? He feels like he might be.

Castle clears his throat and sits up trying to catch the end of what she's saying now.

"And Gates was talking about sending me in with Espo or Ryan but if you're really up for..."

"Yes.." He interrupts nodding and smiling, "yes I am in if you want... me...and, just to clarify," Castle licks his lips, leaning up onto his elbows. "...did you say strip club?

"Mmmhmm...Ryan's going to be so glad he doesn't have to wear a thong." Kate replies breathily as she slips from the bed and meanders out of the room.

"Yea I bet...wait what...?" He cries as he tosses her pillows aside and clambers off of the bed, frantically following her to the door.

"_Male_ strip club Castle..." She confirms, trying not to laugh at the way his eyes pop open wide. "I can't promise it will be as stimulating as_ body shots, _" Kate teases giving in and grinning at him wickedly over her shoulder, "...but I can't wait to see you shaking your ass up on that stage."

He catches her around the waist before she makes it through the door, drags her back to the bed with a squeal and she laughs at him before they hit the soft waiting mattress.

"The only stripping I want to see will be done in the bedroom." He demands hotly, his mouth opening over her breast, sucking heavily on her nipple as she arches beneath him.

"But..." She rocks, opening her legs, letting him fall against her fully, "We are both already...naked Castle." She grumbles, growls, gurgles something against his lips as they leave her chest and claim her mouth.

He kisses her long and deep, fingers running the length of her leg, "Very...very _good _ point...Detective."

She opens to slide her tongue into his mouth, but he's already retreating, dragging down her chest, kissing at her ribs, lathing a circle around the pert pink bud of her nipple before mouthing her stomach.

He presses a kiss to each hip, adding in a little flick of his tongue for good measure, holding her firm when she rises beneath him. Castle kisses her again, mouthing her pubic bone, lips over his teeth so he can nudge and tease. He reaches, mouth never leaving her skin, and drags the discarded sheet up and over his head, her thighs, her waist.

Castle laughs against her huff of annoyance, the squirm of her hips before he licks at her again, teeth chasing the muscle, scraping down down down...until he bites softly at her lower lips.

Moisture bursts across his waiting tongue, he hears her moan his name loudly into the room, teeth teasing briefly before he slides his tongue deep inside her. Going on a little undercover mission all his own.

**THE END**


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